Ariadne's Thread
by The Toe of Sauron
Summary: IDW-AU. They told Sideswipe it was the only way; they had to abandon Sunstreaker to fight the Decepticons, to preserve the greater good. So what is he supposed to do now, when the greater good isn't good enough? Sequel to Us Against the World.
1. Monstrosity

Disclaimer: Transformers and all related intellectual property belong to Has/Tak and IDW Comics. I make nothing from this.

Rated M for violence and thematic elements, but mostly for swearing.

**Ariadne's Thread**

"_It is our choices that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities."_ –J.K. Rowling

**Chapter One: Monstrosity**

Timothy Carter itches to shoot something. It's 2:18 in the morning. The highway is slick with rain but the left two lanes are clear and there's no reason for the prick behind him to be tailgating. He's about three feet from Tim's bumper. It's close enough for Tim to feel the tingling on his plating and it's driving him nuts.

He's already going ninety miles an hour. Advanced robotic shell or no, if he goes any faster he could lose control and slide off the road and wrap himself around a light pole.

_Goddamn son of a bitch_, he thinks.

Tim would probably survive it. It takes a lot to really hurt him these days. His outer body? Not so much.

_The hell is everyone?_

The inside of his head is quiet. The voices are gone. His teammates, headquarters, even the Hub's voice are silent. It's weird. Especially the last one. Tim isn't used to being alone in his head anymore.

((Guys?)) he sends out along his comm line. ((Come on, someone answer me. It's Carter. Hello? Anyone?))

No response. The frequency is dead.

The guy behind him inches up. He's two feet away. Tim considers slowing down and letting the punk eat it. But he can't raise anyone. Can't call for backup. And he can't afford to trash this body.

He can see the other car as they pass beneath a streetlight. He's got cameras embedded in his metal skin, wired right into his brain. Tim recognizes it: a Lamborghini Aventador, just like him. This one is red, though, to Tim's yellow.

The windows are tinted. Tim can't see the driver's features, just a vague silhouette.

_Is this some sort of rich asshole secret-handshake kind of thing?_ he thinks.

The rich asshole inches up.

Tim can shoot him. He's got a rack of missile launchers folded into the back of his car form. It'd take a second to shove a rocket right through Rich Boy's windshield. It's a nice thought. Tim can see it happening. But he's pretty sure blowing up a car on a freeway through downtown Chicago is a bad move, likely to get him noticed and by the _wrong_ people.

Rich Boy's turn signal comes on. He pulls to the left and creeps along Tim's side. Water from the road pelts Tim's undercarriage. Rich Boy levels off. They're both going ninety-two. The passenger side window rolls down.

_Oh, what now?_

The driver stares. It's some kid with dark, spiky hair. He just sits there, eyes fixed on Tim. He doesn't look away, doesn't glance at the road ahead. Just stares, face blank. And then his head swivels forward with no change in expression. The window rolls back up.

_The fuck?_ Tim thinks. The asshole hadn't even blinked. Not once. _Creepy bastard._

The red Lamborghini throttles its engine. It jumps forward, pulls out ahead. The right turn signal comes on and it cuts in front of Tim.

_Oh come one!_

Red lights flare. The asshole slams his brakes.

"Shit!" Tim says.

He twists to the left. Red fills his vision. He's going to hit. He can't avoid it. He's going to cream the other car and he's going to wreck himself and then he'll be _fucked_ because no one's answering his comms and he's not sure there _is_ anyone to answer them—

Something small and shiny drops out from the red car and onto the street. It clatters beneath Tim. A flash of brilliant white and Tim _burns_.

He screams.

Pain rips through him, tears at every nerve ending. He can't see. He can't hear. All he knows is the agony.

And then nothing.

Wet. Wet undercarriage. Rain pattering on his frame. Water dripping, running down his tires. The night air is cool. Tim is curled up in the dark. His eyes are open. He blinks them to be sure. They're open but there's no light. He stares into the dark interior of his robotic shell. A foot of machinery and armor separate Tim's human face from the outside. He blinks again.

_Why can't I see?_

He tries to move his arms. Nothing happens. His real arms—the human-sized ones, anyway—are twisted up somewhere around his ears, locked into the frame of the car. He knows that. But the other ones, the big, robot arms that make up a good portion of the underside of the car, they're not responding.

_Oh shit_, he thinks.

He's stuck. He's stuck in the shell and it's not working and why in god's name can't he _see_?

His ears work just fine. Enough to catch the _shush_ of tires on wet pavement.

_What_? he thinks.

They're big tires, four of them, coming toward him. A car, maybe. Except that he can't hear an engine.

_Come on, come on!_ The visor needs to come back on. He needs to see outside.

The red car. It dropped something, that silver thing. It dropped it beneath Tim and now he can't see or move and there's something next to him, only he can't hear it anymore and _shit_, this can't be good. He needs to get the hell out of here. He needs to freaking _see_—

The visor over his eyes comes on. Soft blue light washes over his face, lights the small space his cyborg body is tucked into. It links into the cameras.

The highway is dark. The streetlights are off. He's stretched halfway across two lanes, pointed in the wrong direction. The streets are quiet.

The red Lamborghini is six inches from his right side.

"Motherfucker!" Tim says.

The red car jerks back. It moves without the rumble of an engine. Tim's limbs turn to slush.

_Oh god, no_.

It's not a car. It's not—

The back half breaks apart. What should be an engine cover splits down the middle. Two halves shift forward and flare out. Something rises out of the back of the car. It's about three feet long, a spinning barrel of gleaming silver. The air hums.

"Oh _fuck_," Tim says.

He tries throwing himself forward. His body won't respond. His tires lock up. He needs to go, needs to run.

He _knows_ that sound.

He's staring down the barrel of an enormous, alien cannon. The red car isn't a car at all. He's going to die here, on a highway in goddamn Illinois if he doesn't get his ass in gear and _move_.

His tires lurch. He rocks back.

_Go! Go!_

The red car—the _alien_—snarls something at him. It isn't in English.

_Go! Go, goddamnit!_

His back wheels spin. Water sprays behind him. Red darts forward, as if to hit him. His front wheels catch. Another blast of sound from Red but Tim doesn't care.

He can see. He can move.

He can run.

He floors it. He's headed in the wrong direction. Three lanes of empty asphalt and he can see headlights in the distance, headlights behind as Red comes after him.

The radar hardwired into his brain tries desperately to read his thought patterns. Only nothing happens. The plastic visor over his eyes doesn't change. The cameras work, he can see the road. But that's all. He can't connect.

His comm-link, radar, targeting systems, _everything_. They're all dead.

Fear slithers in his guts.

The silver thing; whatever Red hit him with, it's knocked out all of his communications.

_Oh god._

Ahead and to the left a lane veers away. It's an off-ramp. Tim twists. The rain coats the road; his tires leave the pavement. The world blurs as he spins. When it stops, he's looking down the ramp. A squeal and a flash of red as the alien whips after him.

Tim takes off.

He reaches the bottom of the ramp, catches a flash of pale blue. A truck horn honks. He cuts to the right; his left side comes off the ground. The truck blares past, inches from smearing him all over the road.

_Shit!_

No time. He floors it.

There's no other traffic. Headlights veer onto the road behind him. Red is coming. Tim speeds up.

He can't access his GPS. He has no idea where he is. He's coming up to a cross street. He turns right again, jolting up and over the sidewalk. An alley to the left. His sides scrape the walls. A dumpster sits at the end. Tim doesn't stop, he doesn't slow. He plows right into it. The dumpster crumples. It goes flying out into the street. Tim hears a crash, see's the smashed hood of some white car as he flies past.

_Go, go, go!_

Headlights behind him again. Red isn't even bothering to fake the sound of an engine.

Tim cuts left. Another cross-street, another turn. He clips the side of a light pole. A handful of cars on the road. Tim screeches onto the sidewalk and cuts around. The traffic light ahead is red. He ignores it.

To the right he sees a glimmer of reflected light. He can smell water. It's a river.

Before Red can find him again he turns, cuts down another alley, twists around to slip behind the backside of a strip mall. The left side is lined by a chain-link fence with dirty white, plastic strips woven through it. Grass grows up through the cracks in the pavement. He hits the end of it and turns left.

He's on the border of a residential area. The nearest lawn is cluttered with junk, the grass long and wild. The owner has parked a pickup truck on the road. Tim creeps up, lights off, and parks behind it. He waits.

Less than a minute later and light filters through the fence, moving slow. If Tim had breath, he'd be holding it. The light moves along the fence. He can't hear a thing. No low growl of an engine. Just a shadow moving in the alley.

A red nose edges out into the street. The car stops.

_Come on_, he thinks. _Keep going. Keep going._

Thirty seconds pass. Red doesn't move. Tim thinks he can feel his armor tingling. Inside the shell, his face is damp. His eyes sting.

Red slips out. It turns right, toward the main street, away from Tim.

Tim almost sags in relief.

The alien waits at the road and then takes off to the left. Half a second later and it's gone.

_Oh, thank god._

He's got to get out of here, out of Chicago, out of Illinois. He's got to find the others. He's got to figure out how to reboot his comms, his radar.

Tim backs out. He keeps to the side streets, past dark houses and empty porches. He finally hits the main road again and turns right, backtracking on himself.

Three minutes later and he spots the glimmer of water again. He turns toward it. The strip-malls disappear, replaced with bigger buildings, warehouses. Up ahead he sees what he thinks used to be a grain silo. It's a tall building. All the windows are busted out. The sides are sprayed with graffiti. It's right on the river's edge.

Next to it is a bridge. Tim pulls off the road and into the dirt lot which had to be the parking lot. The edge is lined with old concrete dividers, but there's a gap in between them. A dirt path runs through them and slips beneath the bridge. There are no lights under there. The spot is hidden from the street. It's perfect.

Tim parks beneath the echoing roar of cars. The water swooshes softly below.

He digs through his mind. He knows he's got a diagnostics program in here somewhere. If he can find it, get it going, maybe he can fix himself. Maybe he can bring up the internet, a map, get the hell out of this place.

He hears a quiet crunching. His rear cameras catch a flash of something shiny.

_What?_

A set of lights blast on. Tim yelps as his rear optics blow out.

Red.

Tim slams himself forward. It's too late. Something smacks into him. He skids and slams his brakes. Dust flies up. Movement as the red car spins around, lining up for another shot.

"Fuck!" Tim says.

He tries to reverse, only the dirt lot ends in grass and then slopes down, into the water.

He jumps forward. Red clips his back bumper.

The path, the path, he has to get to the path.

A humming in the air and Tim feels it in his teeth. A beam of hot blue shoots past him, inches from his nose. The heat blisters his armor. It hits the path ahead in a burst of steam and chewed up earth. Tim skids to a stop.

Just as Red crashes into him again. He spins. The world blurs.

When his vision comes back he finds himself staring at the river again. Tires crunch in the dirt. And then silence.

_Goddamnit!_

He scoots forward and turns. Red sits on the access path, hood facing him. Its cannon is out, pointed at him. It just sits there.

"What the fuck!" Tim says. "What do you want?"

The red alien doesn't respond.

"Come on, you bastard!" he says.

Nothing.

_The __**fuck**__ is it doing?_

Tim turns his wheels to the left. The gun on the back of the red car twitches.

"Oh, come on!" Tim says.

Silence.

"Okay. That's _it_."

A whirring grind rattles through him. His door panels pop off and rotate up as pieces of his undercarriage realign themselves into fingers. His front half splits down the middle and he's already reaching out with fully formed hands to lift himself as his legs shift into place. The last thing to appear—always the last—is his head, sliding up from the back of the Lamborghini. For the first time in a week, Tim stands on two legs as a giant, yellow robot.

His right arm changes, splitting apart and jumbling out to form a gun of his own. He points it at the car. A red cross-hair pops onto his visor. His weapon systems are working.

Red hasn't moved.

"Well, come on then," he says.

For a long moment, the other robot doesn't respond. It just sits there, silent. Then it shifts. The gun folds back in. The outer frame breaks apart as the thing changes itself and climbs to its feet.

The robot is about Tim's height, maybe fifteen feet tall. It's bulkier than him; it's got larger arms. It's mostly red and silver, with some splashes of black thrown in around the head, hands, and groin. It has a helmet with a pair of stubby horns on the sides. It almost looks silly, except that the whole thing is thick and solid, all sharp angles.

It just stands there, staring at him. It hasn't drawn any more weapons.

"What are you looking at?" Tim says.

The robot tilts its head to the side and says, "You don't recognize me, do you?"

Tim snorts. It sounds strange, synthesized.

"Should I?" he says.

It's hard to tell on the alien face, but Tim thinks the thing scowls at him. Tim eyes the dirt path leading to the road.

"What do you want?" he says.

The robot smiles.

"You're one of those 'Headmasters,' right?" it says. Before Tim can answer, it says, "I need to ask you a few questions."

"The hell you do," Tim says. His gun whines. He takes aim.

"Hey, calm down," the robot says, holding its hands up and to the side. It wiggles its fingers. "See? No weapons."

"Yeah right," he says.

The red robot is still smiling. "Listen, I just came to talk to you. Now you can calm down and we can get this over with or you can _try_—and I emphasize that point—to shoot me and run off. You'll miss and I'll have to track you down again and when I find you, Timothy, I will _not_ be happy."

"What did you say?"

The robot stares at him for a second and says, "You want me to repeat that whole thing again?"

"How do you know my _name_?" Tim says.

Red's smile turns into a grin. "Oh. That. I had a chat with Gordon. You remember Gordon, don't you? He's one of you, another Headmaster?"

"What the hell does that mean? Where—"

"You lost contact with everyone, didn't you." It isn't a question. "About three days ago you woke up in a scrap yard or on the side of the road and you haven't been able to reach anyone. You figured you'd hang around here, try to find one of the others. Only you haven't had any luck. You're all alone."

"How… who are you?"

"Answer my question and I'll answer yours."

Tim glances behind the robot. The dirt road isn't that far. He figures he'd have a fifty-fifty chance of getting past the red bastard. But he can't navigate, can't even tell where he is.

"What was the question?" Tim says.

"You came here from Tampa," Red says. "No, don't bother arguing. I've already been there. Nothing but a burnt-out husk. Whoever you work for made sure nothing was left."

_What_? Tim thinks. _But—_

"I know, I know. 'It can't be true! They wouldn't abandon me'!" The high-pitched mockery is even worse on a synthesized voice and Tim can't stop himself from shuddering. "It's gone. Kaput. Zip. Nada. Now, I _know_ there's a back-up facility, another headquarters. I need to know where that is."

_What the hell is it talking about? The warehouse burned down? What's going on?_

"Who the hell are you?" Tim says.

"Uh uh. Not until you answer me."

Something has happened, something bad. And he has no idea what it is. His memories are screwed up. The last two weeks are a fragmented blur.

_The robot knows_, he thinks. It's standing there; its arms have dropped back down to its sides. So far it's made no move towards him. Still, something is off. Something isn't right.

"Why are you alone?" Tim says.

The robot's expression doesn't change. Tim still senses a shift. Maybe it's the way the thing's head lowers. Or maybe it's the way the shoulders tense. Suddenly, even though it's smiling at him, the robot looks a lot more menacing.

"Come on, Timothy," it says. "It's not that hard. Just tell me where the other headquarters is and you walk away."

Tim looks around, tries to spot another low shadow, another of the robots. Because these things don't travel alone. They don't do _this_. They hide. They skulk around in the shadows.

_How the __**hell**__ does it know about Machination? How did it find me? How did it find the others? What—_

Something clicks.

"You said you talked to Gordon," Tim says.

"Yeah."

"What happened to him?"

Something cold flickers in the alien's eyes. It lunges at him. Tim unfolds the missile launchers over his shoulders and fires all three at once. Red tucks to his right and rolls. Tim backs away, firing his rifle the whole time.

The missiles detonate. The world turns white. The blast rocks through his body. Half a second later, his eyes come back on. All he sees is smoke and dust and gravel pattering to the ground. He tracks to the left and down.

Movement!

Tim's rifle jerks down but it's too late. Red is already coming up and even as Tim backpedals, the robot grabs his arm. Its other hand clamps over Tim's face. Tim is pulled forward as his face is pushed back. Everything tilts. He freezes. Then he hits the ground.

"Aaah!"

Red is on top of him. Its hand lifts up and Tim catches a glimpse of silver. The robot grabs him again, twists his head around. Tim kicks, feels his foot hit something. He squirms. A terrible force latches onto his head and begins to _squeeze_.

"Oh god! Stop! _Please_!"

The pressure lets up, but only a little.

"You listen to me, you pathetic little meat-bag," the robot says, its face inches away. "I will rip the head right off this cheap imitation and I will squeeze until your fleshy bits _ooze_ out if you don't shut the slag up and hold _still_."

Through the haze of pain and fear, Tim can hear the very real threat in the robot's voice. It wastes no time. Something jabs into the back of his head. He thinks he screams. His body convulses. He can hear himself rattling. Within the robotic shell of a head, his cyborg body spasms. Even though the robot holds him to the dirt, it doesn't stop his limbs from flailing, his back from arching.

He feels a sudden, sharp pain. A metallic taste fills his mouth. He's bitten his tongue.

That isn't the worst part. He's no longer alone in his mind. Another presence, strange and alien. He can feel it in there, digging around through his memories. It doesn't say anything, not even when Tim screams, while he begs it to stop. It reaches in and a memory surfaces. Tim can see it, a movie playing in his mind.

—_He's propped up on the bed, the stumps of his right leg and arm swaddled in bandages. Machines blipped around him. Oprah was on; some special about gastro-bypass surgery. He lay there, listening to the fat chicks complaining about how miserable their lives were and started to laugh. He couldn't stop. Not even when the nurses came in and grabbed a syringe and—_

—_He could hear cars. It was the first thing he noticed, that distant sound of engines and a whooshing. A highway? Birds, now. Little birds. He tried to open his eyes but something was wrong. He couldn't see. He started to panic, tried to reach up only to find that his arms weren't working and for one, terrible moment, he thought he was back in that truck. But then the diagnostics program kicked in and he remembered: the implants. Dante. His new body. He tried—_

((Too far.))

"Oh god! Stop! Please, stop!"

—_Dante. The warehouse. The air was thick here. Heavy in his lungs. His shirt stuck to his chest and all he'd done was __**lay**__ there. Mr. Dante said something as they wheeled him across the pavement towards the large building. He looked up at the man's eyes, shaded by that ridiculous, over-sized cowboy hat—_

((No.))

—_Inside. It was cooler here. Louder, too. Mechanical sounds. Squealing whirs, a rhythmic thumping somewhere else. Mr. Dante was talking._

"…_and at this rate, we can produce one of these bodies every three days," the older man said. "Of course, these are just the first wave—the prototypes, if you will. You'll be starting with one of them. There will be upgrades later, but for now, well, we'll see how it goes."—_

((No.))

—_His mouth was dry. It was the first thing he noticed. His teeth hurt, too. So did his jaw. His eyes. __**Everything**__ hurt. And the lights—_

((Where is it?))

—_His first steps. He almost started to cry but Mr. Dante was standing right there and he didn't want to look like an idiot. He stood on two feet. He could feel them as if they were his own legs._

"_How's it feel, son?" _

_He'd looked up at Mr. Dante and grinned—_

((Slaggit.))

—_the yellow robot head dangled there, suspended from the ceiling by cables. Plating had been removed and he could see little wires and blinking lights inside. There was something that looked like a camera lens where an eyeball would be, and as he walked by it, the lens turned toward him. It retracted a little, as if trying to focus. There were wires coming out the side of its gaping mouth. Tim thought it looked like the thing was eating spaghetti._

"_Right this way, Mr. Carter," the assistant—__**was his name Beckart?—**__said. _

_An alcove opened up in the wall next to the suspended head. Pieces folded out. Beckarm smiled at him and waved him over._

_The robot made a strange sound. Tim couldn't tell if it was supposed to be a growl or a whine—_

—_nearing their target. Two cars ahead. They hadn't been spotted yet. The—_

—_**shit! Where did that bastard go? Where**__—_

"—_know at first it's a bit disorienting, but you learn to ignore it."_

_The Voice was always there, overlapping his mind. He could feel the thing's anger and pain. Its humiliation._

"_It's all a façade anyway," Gordon said. "Just some clever programming. Makes them seem alive. But these are automatons. It's all just a trick your mind plays on you. We all learn how to block that out. Now—"_

—_driving. The target had disappeared off the grid. A sudden pain and his world went white and—_

—_Christ, it hurt! Worse than anything in his life, worse than anything he could think of. Another voice, too, and some part of him knew it was the robot—_

An emotion bubbles up in the back of Tim's mind. Only it's not his mind and it's not his emotion. It _burns_.

—_woke up on the side of the road. His panic. Confusion. He tried the uplink but nothing happened. He couldn't raise anyone. He had to keep himself together. He couldn't freak out—_

—_dark out. He was getting tired. He'd spent all day driving around, looking for something, someone familiar, calling over and over but no one was responding—_

—_stumbled out of the alcove in the wall and he __**ached**__. Beckman was there to catch him. He groaned and raised shaking hands to his face to feel the metallic covers where his ears should have been._

"_How are you feeling?" Berkman said._

"_Ugh," he said. He glanced over to where two guys in white lab coats were fussing over the yellow head. It was leaking a shining pink substance from one of the open panels. Though it was physically silent, he could still somehow hear it, in his head, screaming—_

Tim's mind goes blank. The Thing in his head withdraws and Tim collapses. He knows he's whimpering but he can't stop. His limbs tremble. He's aware of the robot somewhere to his left. He can't see it. He can't see anything. He knows it isn't in his mind anymore and that's all that matters. He tries to pull his arms and legs in but he's shaking too badly and they won't move.

Far off, he can hear sirens. The rush of cars on the bridge above has disappeared and he thinks he can make out voices, human voices, though he can't understand the words. Still nothing from the robot and Tim forces his hands to come up, palms against the ground. He pushes. His arms shake and it takes two attempts before he can lift himself far enough to pull one leg up. He stops there, fans whir inside his body as it tries to cool itself. Funny, he didn't even notice that he was overheating. He can feeling something on his human skin, on his face. A warm liquid dribbles down around his eyes and nose. But even as he kneels there, he can feel it stop, can feel his tongue knit back together. It's part of the "upgrades" they'd installed when they gave him his life back.

Tim hears a hiss and turns his head. The image comes in fuzzy—his eyes don't want to work—but it's enough for him to recognize the barrel of a gun hovering an inch from his face.

Tim freezes.

"Wha… what are you doing?" he says. His voice sounds raw, broken. Half of it comes out as static.

"I think that's pretty obvious," the red robot says. It doesn't sound much better.

Tim tries to stand but ends up slipping, flopping over to land on his ass. He kicks, scoots back a few feet until his hands plunge into the river.

"You said you'd let me go!"

"I said I'd let you walk," the robot says. Its voice is steady, a flat monotone. The gun on its arm, however, trembles. "I didn't say how far."

The sirens are getting louder. He can definitely hear voices now. People standing up on the road, leaning out over the side of the bridge. The robot seems to notice this at the same time and it looks back, toward the path.

Tim takes his chance. He throws himself up to his feet. His punch misses. He slams into the robot. They both hit the ground and Red reaches up. Its hand snags over one of the sensor fins on the side of Tim's head. Tim flails. Red lifts an arm to protect its face, but Tim isn't aiming for that. He grabs the gun on its arm with both hands and wrenches to the side. The robot shifts. Something wedges up near his waist. It's the thing's foot. The next thing he knows, Tim catapults through the air, ass over end.

He hits the ground and rolls, coming to a stop on his back. He moans.

A scuffle and a crunch as the robot climbs to its feet. Tim manages to roll himself onto his side just in time to see Red pluck the dangling weapon from its forearm. Wires snap and spark and the robot lifts the crumpled gun and inspects it. Then it scowls; it tosses the thing over its shoulder. Tim hears a splash as it hits the water. The robot looks back to him. Panels along its arms slide apart and jumble out, shifting down until the robot's forearms form a solid mass.

_Oh shit_.

It walks at him, eyes all pale, and Tim knows that if it catches him with those arms just once, it will all be over. He scrambles, stumbles to his feet. He throws himself into his transformation sequence.

The robot lunges. Tim isn't finished—that doesn't stop him from tearing forward, wheels spinning in the dirt. Panels slide over his torso. The world goes dark. Then the screen over his eyeballs lights up. Tim accelerates, fishtailing on the loose path. His rear cameras are blown, he can't see behind him, and he's glad of it, because he doesn't want to see the expression on the robot's face. He reaches the concrete dividers, flies by the building and the piles of gravel and dirt, and finds the driveway.

A smattering of pedestrians scatter as he comes roaring out onto the street, all except for some kid who just stands there and gapes like a retard. Tim cuts a hard right. He sees a jumble of limbs as the kid throws himself back.

He slides. He catches himself and floors it as people shout around him. The road is jammed with cars. Red and blue lights flash ahead. They won't catch him. It only takes a second to hit the first cross-street and Tim almost curbs himself on the left turn, swerving out of incoming traffic and into the right lane.

There's still no sign of the robot. No headlights. No alien shrieks. Just people honking as he tears past. He's going about seventy miles-per-hour; the lights pass by in a blur. Another cross street. He doesn't even slow. He needs to get away, find someplace open, public, where the robot won't come after him.

Up ahead is a dark swathe of trees. It's a park, right in the middle of a stand of houses. Tim veers to the right, into the park. If he can just stay—

He catches a flash of pale blue. He senses something large and dark and fast above him.

_Oh_— Tim thinks.

Something hits him hard. He registers the impact, the crunch, the hot lance of agony and—

* * *

><p>Sideswipe lifts his foot from the twisted wreckage and gives it a few shakes. Fluids spatter onto the road. He grimaces.<p>

There's only one more pseudo-signal left. One more of Sunny's ghosts for him to track down. One more monstrosity to take care of. One more lead. His last chance to find his brother.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> Bet you never thought you'd see this sequel. And it only took three years to finish. A very heartfelt thank you to KayDeeBlu who slogged through and beta'd this thing for me. Seriously. She's a trooper (and made of at least 75% awesome sauce).

Next week: Chapter Two-Don't Panic.

(Geek bonus: Sideswipe's theme song for this fic is "In the House In a Heart Beat" from the 28 Days Later soundtrack.)


	2. Don't Panic

**Chapter Two: Don't Panic**

The park is awash in flashing blue and red and white lights. Half of the neighborhood is outside on their porches, on their lawns; the braver ones hover next to the yellow tape and the officers posted to keep them there. Most of them are dressed in their pajamas. One of them is wearing bunny slippers.

Jerri Stephens rubs the back of her neck where a headache is brewing.

"Hey! Anderson!"

She turns. It's Officer Bobby Kowaleski. She lifts a hand at him.

Jerri counts five news vans along the edge of the crime scene; five teams of reporters lined up next to each other, their backs to the chaos.

_Great_, she thinks. _That's what we need._

Even worse are the two rental SUV's parked on the grass next to the ambulance.

"Fucking feds," Kowaleski says as he jogs over. "They're taking the crime scene."

_There's a shock._

"Yep," she says. "They say why?"

"Some bullshit about a murder over in Indiana."

"Hmm."

The feds stick out under the portable spot lights. They're the only ones in suits. There are four of them, three men and a woman. One of the men catches Jerri's attention. She knows his face. She's got it in a file back at her apartment.

She grinds her teeth.

"—'course that doesn't explain the John Doe," Kowaleski says.

"Oh yeah?" Jerri says.

The fed squats down, peering at something on the ground. He reaches into his pocket, pulls out a pen, and pokes at it.

"You didn't see it?" Kowaleski says.

Jerri blinks and looks over at him.

"Nah," she says. "Sattler had me running patrol. I just got here."

"That sucks. Here, come on. I'll show you."

Two of the agents cluster around the coroner's van. The woman unzips a body bag. Jerri tags after the Officer as they pick their way over, past the CSI's and their flashing cameras, careful not to touch anything. A field of broken glass glitters all over the road. They stop at the edge of it.

"Shit," Jerri says.

"I know," Kowaleski says.

It's a yellow sports car, some Italian thing, all sharp angles and glaring headlights. One of the wiper blades is missing and the windshield is cracked. But the real damage is in the back. It's completely demolished. The trunk is flattened, pancaked all over the road. Pieces lie everywhere. The rear wheels have popped off—a CSI is taking pictures of one of them next to a tree some twenty feet away. There are spatters of some sort of dark liquid; it's not engine oil.

"Where'd they find the driver?" she says.

Kowaleski grins. "That's the thing. They're not sure _who_ they found. He was back there."

"In the trunk?"

Kowaleski rolls his eyes. "Jesus, Anderson. It's a Lamborghini. The trunk's in the front. How do you not know that?"

Jerri shrugs.

"That's the engine," Kowaleski says. "They found the guy's head,_ just_ the head, in the engine."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah. It's some real X-Files shit."

"Huh," Jerri says. She looks at her watch. "Hey, I gotta get back. Meet me at the station?"

"Sure."

It takes three minutes to weave through the crime scene. She parked her cruiser on the edge, away from prying eyes, out of sight of the reporters. She climbs in, shuts the door, and reaches into her pocket for her cell phone. She flips it open and dials.

It'll take twenty-five minutes to get back to her apartment. She can have everything packed up and the place wiped down in an hour, maybe two. In three hours time, "Officer Anderson" will be a distant memory.

The ringing stops. There's a click on the other end and then silence.

"This is Stephens," Jerri says. "Tell Berkman we've got another one."

* * *

><p>Hunter O'Nion listens to the distant echoes of a car engine and waits. The parking garage is almost empty. Three other cars are tucked against the far wall, by the elevator. It's 2:32 in the morning and it's still eighty-seven degrees out. Not that it bothers him. Not anymore.<p>

Because Hunter isn't really human anymore. What's left of him is curled up with the machinery hidden in the back of a yellow Lamborghini named Sunstreaker. Or used to be. Because Sunstreaker isn't there anymore, either. It's just Hunter, alone in his head, sitting beneath a skyscraper in the middle of Dallas, waiting for his chance to break into what might be the headquarters of a secret organization bent on world domination.

_This is crazy_, he thinks.

And that's not even the start of it.

He's got a comm-line open. He's been keeping it that way, on and off, for the last week, waiting to hear something. Waiting to hear from a ship hidden beneath Lake Michigan. The one that, like Sunstreaker's consciousness, has also disappeared.

One week ago, Hunter woke up in a repo lot in southern Georgia. There was a boot on his front, left tire. A peeling, orange tag had been slapped on his back bumper. And he had no idea why. The last thing he remembered was fleeing Florida with Sunstreaker shouting in his mind.

Hunter sighs. The sound is pure noise. Because he doesn't breathe anymore.

_Don't go there_, he thinks. _You've got a job to do._

There are five security cameras between him and the elevator. He watches their feeds on a sort of visor that folds down over his own, human eyes. He can see himself tucked into a dark corner. He'll have to disable them.

It's tricky. Hunter's never been plugged into a computer network with his brain before. He has to visualize what he's doing, assign icons in his head as he navigates the system.

He doesn't cut the feed. Behind the footage on his screen he watches eight moving, green dots. Eight people in the building above him. One of them is bound to be watching the surveillance.

He's been recording all five cameras for the last forty-five minutes. Instead, he cuts them off, uploads the recorded feed into the network, and inserts it. A tiny blip, not noticeable to the human eye, and he's done. He flashes his headlights. The image on his visor doesn't change.

_Okay_, he thinks.

The other cars in the lot have been there for two and a half hours. None of the people inside have come down. No one else is in there. He needs to go now, while it's quiet.

Hunter eases out of the corner. He doesn't need an engine to move forward. This body is no more car than he is. The only sound is the whisper of tires on the pavement. When he's got enough clearance to keep himself from banging into the wall, he closes his eyes.

First, comes a whirring grind; it reverberates throughout his entire body. He starts to break apart. His undercarriage separates, pieces twist around to become fingers, hands, arms to push himself up with. The hood of the car splits down the middle. Feet form. Legs. Soon, he's fifteen feet of yellow robot crouched in an underground parking garage.

Or so he seems.

He's only done the next part once before. He lifts up his hands—big, black, metal ones— to grab his head. And he _concentrates_.

A deep _thunk_ and a rapid clicking in his neck. Suddenly, his head is free. He can't feel his hands anymore. The yellow body bends down and sets the head on the pavement. The two fins—one on either side—crack and shift apart. Smaller hands emerge. Pieces fold into legs and hips. Then the top of the helmet slides back and Hunter O'Nion feels air on his real face for the first time in days.

He blinks. He rubs his face—the only part of him that's still human. The hands are made of metal. They're the right size, the same shape, and they work just as well as flesh and blood hands. But they're a few degrees cooler than they should be.

The muggy air settles on him. Despite not breathing, he can still somehow smell the heat and humidity and engine oil.

The visor still covers his eyes. He's looking out, into the parking lot, and also watching the video footage at the same time. It shows a yellow Lamborghini parked in the corner. It doesn't show a cyborg standing around or the headless robot behind him.

Hunter turns. The robotic shell is crouched there, hands extended. He focuses and the thing straightens and shuffles back into the corner. It kneels down.

_What'll happen if anyone comes down here and sees this?_

He can't turn back. He's been scoping the building out for the last two days. If this place is connected to Machination, someone is bound to notice him. If he doesn't do this now, he may not get another chance.

He heads for the elevator.

The ride up is boring. Twenty-two floors of soft-rock radio piped through the speakers. Then he's there. The door lets out a _ding_ and opens.

There are no cameras in here. Which is why he's picked this level. People who wire their entire building, people who want to be able to see every nook and cranny in the place, do not leave an entire floor dark for no reason.

He steps out. His foot sinks into thick carpeting.

He's standing in some sort of reception area. A long, low desk cut into a half circle sits in the middle of the room. To his right, a dark hallway. To his left, a set of double doors. He notices that for all the fancy desks and plush carpeting, there's nowhere to sit.

Hunter tries the double doors first. It's some sort of conference room: tables and chairs set against a backdrop of floor-to-ceiling windows. Nothing spectacular. The other hallway is lined with offices, all of them empty. It ends with a single door. Hunter tries the handle. It's unlocked. He glances back.

_This is way too easy_.

This is not a lackey's office. It's at least the size of the conference room, most of it empty space. Potted ferns sit in the corners next to another huge wall of windows. The walls are lined with photographs: some old guy in a suit standing with other old guys in suits. A monstrous desk sits to the far right, underneath a massive sign with the words "Epsilon Holdings" encased in a stylized swoosh. And next to the desk, tucked into the far corner, is a stand of two, five-foot tall filing cabinets.

_Bingo_.

The filing cabinets _are_ locked. It takes Hunter two seconds to rip them open. He almost drops the first drawer as it comes flying out at him. He catches it before it spills out all over the floor. Inside are folders, labeled: Aylor, Bazizeh, Bath. Another drawer: Suzuki, Svenson, Swain. All of them are filled with senseless paperwork—data sheets and reports, pages of numbers that Hunter can't make heads or tails of. Stock information, contracts. All of it mundane. All of it useless.

"_Damn_it," Hunter says.

_Of course you were expecting… what? A great big folder labeled 'Machination'? Or how about 'My plans for world domination'? Because __**that**__ would be the smart thing to do. Leave stuff lying around where some bungling idiot can just waltz in and find it._

"Damn," he says. He slides the drawers back in and leans his head on the cool frame.

_What the hell am I __**doing**__ here? I don't even know what I'm looking for!_

He clenches his fists—_machine, it's all machine now_. It takes everything he has not to drive one through the filing cabinet. But leaving a gaping hole in the thing isn't exactly subtle and Mr. Chairman, whoever he is, will notice in the morning and wonder how it got there.

_Don't do this_, he thinks. _You can't afford to do this. Calm down. Keep looking._

For one, small moment, he almost, almost sounds like Sunstreaker. Hunter manages a smile. _God, he was such a prick. But at least he was there. At least I wasn't alone._

Unlike now, standing by himself in a dark office on the twenty-second floor of what could be the secret lair of the people that ruined his life, ruined the life of at least one Autobot. And he doesn't even know what he's looking for. He doesn't know how long his body is going to stay hidden, doesn't know if he's managed to set off a silent alarm somewhere, wondering where he's going to go if this doesn't—

_**Stop**__ it._

Hunter stands straight and unclenches his hands. He closes his eyes, counts to eight, and opens them. He turns to the desk.

Three drawers line the side. He goes through them all and finds nothing but more meaningless paperwork, a watch, a package of golf balls, and a half-empty tick-tack bottle.

_This can't have been for nothing. I __**know**__ they're connected. There has to be something, some sort of trail._

He doesn't notice at first when a dot on his visor changes colors. It's not until it starts to flash that he looks up from the desk and to the left. It's turned yellow. The words "proximity alert" scroll across the bottom. He stares at it until his brain registers that the flashing dot is moving. It's rising up, _toward_ him.

It's coming straight at Hunter's floor. The teen moves away from the desk and cracks the door open. He presses the side of his face against the frame. A moment later and the dot slows. Hunter hears a soft _ding._ Light spills into the reception area down the hall. A shadow moves; a man steps out.

Hunter squints. The man is too far away, he can't see any—

One moment, the guy is a speck of light blue some fifty feet away; the next, he rushes forward, fills Hunter's vision. Hunter almost yelps; he manages to swallow it back before he can give himself away.

_What the hell?_

It's the screen. It's zoomed in. Hunter looks to the left and then back. He can see the receptionist's desk like he's standing next to it.

"Whoa," he says.

The man walks forward. He's wearing a blue shirt and dark pants. He's older, maybe in his late forties, but what catches Hunter's attention is the patch on his right arm, the one that says "security."

"Aw, crap."

The guard lifts something from his belt. A light snaps on. Hunter sinks down into a crouch, his head level with the doorknob. The guard walks over to the doors to the conference room, cracks them open, disappears inside. He reappears five seconds later. Hunter ducks back as the guard lifts his arm.

The guard shines his flashlight through the gap. A small strip of carpet lights up. Muffled footfalls come down the hall.

_Shit, oh shit, oh shit!_

He looks around for some place to hide.

_The desk!_

He stumbles to his feet. He can hear one of the office doors opening down the hall. He darts across the carpet, throws himself down behind the polished behemoth and scoots under it. The back goes all the way down, right to the floor. He brings his legs in, curls up as best he can with Sunstreaker's pointy ear fins jutting up from his shoulders.

_This isn't going to work_, he thinks. _That guy's gonna check over here and he's gonna see me and how the hell do I get out of here?_

Footsteps stop outside the door. Hunter wishes he had enough room to kick himself.

He's left it open.

The wall above the desk lights up. Three footsteps, muffled by the thick carpet, and a pause.

His arm is sticking out, he's sure of it. The guard must be drawing his gun. Any second now, he's gonna open fire and Hunter has no goddamn backup plan because, hey, it's just breaking into a skyscraper, right? Why work on a backup plan?

_Stupid, stupid, __**stupid**__!_

A soft click. Hunter tenses. Then a chirp and the guard says, "Twenty-two is green." Another chirp and the voice on the other end says, "Copy."

And just like that, the guard walks away. Hunter doesn't move. Not until the door shuts, the latch clicks, not until he watches the yellow dot move back down the hall, stop outside the elevator and start back down. Only then does he let himself slump. The back of his head thumps on the side of the desk.

"Way too close," he says. He unfurls himself, careful not to gouge out a strip of carpet along the way.

He needs to leave. One close call is enough for the night. If he hasn't found anything by now…

The dot stops flashing and changes back to a harmless, soft green. He stands up, runs his hand over his face.

_Okay,_ he thinks, _get back to the stairwell. Take that back down to the parking garage and get out of here._

He starts to move around the desk and stops when he bumps into the bottom drawer. It's still open. He reaches down, starts to close it, and freezes.

_How did the guard miss that?_

He looks down only to find that the building is clear. No dots anywhere. His fingers tingle.

And that's when he hears it: a soft noise, something he wouldn't have, _couldn't _have picked up with human ears. A click and a long, slow scrape, like a doorknob turning. The room is dark, lit only by his visor and the ambient light of the city outside.

No dots. None. The entire building is dark and empty. Even the street… no. Not empty. He watches something, he thinks it's a car, suddenly disappear. Ten seconds later and it reappears on the other side of the block.

_Like a blind spot,_ he thinks.

He swallows and pads over to the door. He opens it slowly; the noise of the latch sounds loud. He peers through. The hallway is dark, deserted. Nothing moves.

_Getting paranoid?_

Hunter stands there for a moment, trying to convince himself that he's just overreacting. Maybe the visor is glitching out. Stress. It's just stress—

A shadow rolls into view down the hall. He has a second to register the movement, see a flash of something shiny before his brain recognizes the shape. It's a man. And he's holding a gun.

"_Shit_."

He throws himself back. Bullets tear through the door, spraying him with shrapnel and he falls back, pawing at the air, trying to cover his eyes. The gun is loud, way louder than anything he's ever heard on TV, a steady, rapid BAM! BAM! BAM! BAM! He can feel himself screaming but he can't hear it over the cacophony.

Just like that, the world goes silent. At first, he thinks they've stopped shooting, but the door is still blowing apart. He's gone deaf. He's turned his ears off.

They're coming for him. Hunter ducks down and sprints, tries to keep his head down and his arms close. Then, miraculously, he's through the bullets and halfway across the room. He almost plows into the desk. He can feel vibrations in the floor now and imagines booted feed pounding down the hall.

He grabs the desk and hefts it up like Superman. He turns, takes a few steps. He sees a flurry of movement through the holes in the door. It starts to swing open—he sees a gloved hand reaching in.

The desk flies through the air, bounces once, and lands against the door. Hunter slams into it before the gunmen can react. He digs his feet into the carpet and pushes—

Something crunches. Hunter doesn't let himself think about that.

They're ramming the door. He presses both hands against his barricade, hopes that it will hold the door together. The thick wood is blasted, pockmarked with gaping holes. Movement behind it. He wonders how long it will take someone to stick their gun through—

Something slams into his right shoulder. It throws him forward. He scrambles back to hold the desk. Guns stick through the holes and swivel down. The air next to his cheek snaps. A bullet just misses his face. He ducks to the side.

_Oh god, oh __**god**__! What the hell do I __**do**__?_

The desk shudders. It scoots across the carpet. He has maybe two seconds before they're in. His shoulder is on fire. There's nothing else in the room to hide behind, nothing to use as a weapon. The only exit is through the windows and a twenty-two story drop is a long way to fall, even for a cyborg.

Wood splinters. The desk goes flying. The first gunman is inside.

_I need my body!_ _I need it now!_

Someone climbs in.

_Shit, shit, __**shit!**_

The man's gun is pointed right at him. Hunter doesn't think; his arms shoot up, over his head.

"Whoa!" he says. "No, no! I surrender!"

More gunmen enter the room, spreading out, surrounding him. He crouches there, forehead tingling, wondering just when someone will pull the trigger, just when a bullet will rip through his skull and spatter whatever is left of his brains—

His ears turn back on.

"—on the ground now! Get on the ground!"

"Okay!" Hunter says. He lowers himself onto his stomach.

_God, this can't be happening._

He needs out. He can't get caught, not now. He eyeballs the windows.

"Face down!"

_Shit!_

His hands are on the carpet. He's close enough to smell it. One of the gunmen moves forward. His weight drops down onto Hunter's back. Hands close around his wrists.

_God, no!_

A sound outside, something crunching and crashing.

His arms are wrenched down, around and behind his back. The gunman fumbles for something. Another moves in.

He's gonna be sick. The room sways. He catches a glimpse of one of them lift a wrist and say, "Secured."

The floor beneath him trembles. Suddenly, the whole room dips. The man pinning him falls forward.

"What the—" one of them says.

Movement out of the corner of his eye. Glass shatters. Warm, humid air wafts over him. Hunter twists his head, sees a flash of yellow, and a large, black hand reaching through the jagged remains of the windows. It plows into the swarm of gunmen. Three of them are swatted through the air. The rest keep shooting until it makes a second pass and knocks them head over heels.

His first, irrational thought is: _It's Sunstreaker!_ But then reality asserts itself and he realizes that it's his robotic body.

_How the hell is it out there?_

The hand pulls back out and latches onto the windowsill. The body shifts; the room rocks.

_It's hanging onto the side._

Hunter's robotic body has pulled a King Kong.

The man sitting on him swears. He lets go of Hunter's wrists and reaches for his weapon. Hunter pushes himself up with one hand and grabs a fistful of cloth in the other. He pulls the man down; he lands face-first on the carpet. Then Hunter is up, running for the windows. The arm in the room lifts up, fingers stretched, reaching for Hunter.

A bullet clips the side of his head. Hunter stumbles. The gunmen are getting back to their feet. One of them shouts into his wrist. Sparks light up on his shell's torso as they shoot it.

Something hits him just above the left knee, like someone took a baseball bat to it. He goes down into the shattered glass. His arm—the giant, yellow one—drops down behind him, sheltering him from the gunfire. He glances down and sees a hole. Dark fluid spurts out and dribbles down his leg.

Hunter throws himself into transforming. His knees pull a freaky reversal; he can feel the peculiar grind. He tries not to look, tries not to wonder if it's bone making that noise or just gears mimicking bone, tries not to picture how muscle and sinew would have to tear and fold in like that. The wound to his knee doesn't even slow the process and he hopes that the bullet went all the way through, hopes the wound isn't as bad as it feels.

His arms fold up and turn inward. Suddenly, his right shoulder stops. Pain bites into his neck. The golden, robotic arm jerks. Hunter twists around and peers through the gloom at his shoulder. There's a ragged hole, just above the pointy head fin jutting from his shoulder. That fluid—black, thick stuff—seeps out, smearing the cabling bunched up over his bicep.

_Shit! Is the bullet still __**in**__ there?_

His arm won't turn. He can't see the bullet, can't pull it out. He doesn't have time. Sooner or later someone outside is going to notice the yellow robot hanging off the skyscraper.

_Come on! Come on!_

He tries to shove the pain away, focus on _making_ his arm change. The floor vibrates beneath him. Footsteps. They're coming.

_Fucking go!_

His shoulder lets out a squealing grind. His arm pops out of its socket and twists up like it's supposed to. The rest passes by in the strange-familiar sensation of becoming a piece of human origami. The last thing to go is his head. Panels over his chest slide up and his head folds down; his chin tucks into where his collarbone used to be. The world goes dark. Then the visor lights up and he can see again. It's like watching an I-Max movie a few centimeters from his eyeballs. He watches his hand lift up, feels the fingers close around him. Slight disorientation as he's lifted up and the carpet rushes past in a blur before dropping away and he stares twenty-two stories down to the ground below.

_Don't panic_, he thinks. _Do __**not**__ panic!_

As soon as he clears the windowsill, he turns himself—his head—around so that he's looking back into the room. The gunmen have regrouped. Their guns flash. The bullets don't mean much anymore, not with his armor plating. He brings himself up to where he thinks his neck is. A grind reverberates through his body and he catches on something. Then a snap. He can feel himself holding himself. He can feel the bullets pinging off his larger frame.

_I gotta get out of here!_

Which is easier said than done. Holes are punched into the side of the building, trailing away beneath him. He's got his feet buried somewhere around the twentieth floor. His right hand hovers over his head, the left wrapped around the top, left corner of the roof. It's a long way down and though he's sheltered within this body, there's something about clinging to the face of a skyscraper as it sways in the wind that makes him glad he doesn't have to worry about wetting himself.

He can't think about falling. Can't imagine himself crumpling like a soda can when he hits the ground, tries not to envision the way his real body will be skewered when his legs drive up into his torso and pieces—

_Stop that. Seriously. Just move your foot—oh. Oops._

A piece of the twentieth floor spirals down into the night. He winces when he hears a distant crash.

_I really hope that wasn't someone's car._

His left foot dangles in the empty space where a chunk of carpeted floor used to be. Apparently, the architects didn't have a three ton robot playing Spider-man in mind when they built the thing.

He lowers himself, digs his left foot in a convenient hole in the façade.

_Okay, okay. Doing good. Just—wait._

The shooting has stopped.

Hunter looks up. He's still eye-level with the top floor, so he can very clearly see the grenade launcher as the gunman settles it on his shoulder and points it right at Hunter's face.

_Oh. __**Shit**__._

The man squeezes the trigger. There's a bright flash. Hunter sees the smoke trail as the thing comes streaking toward him. He ducks. The sudden shift in weight is too much for the building; his handhold crumbles. The grenade hisses overhead and explodes somewhere behind him. And Hunter suddenly finds himself wind milling one arm.

"Whoa, whoa! No!"

The floor crumbles beneath his feet.

_No!_

He falls.

He claws at the wall, tries to dig in his fingers. He tears long gouges down the side of the skyscraper. But it doesn't hold—he weighs too much. He has three seconds to panic before he hits the ground.

The next thing he knows his visual screen flickers. He's staring up at the night sky. He's on his back. His whole body—human and robot—aches. His shoulder hurts so bad that for a moment he can't even move.

Debris floats down; mostly papers. The side of the building is slashed open in long, jagged tears. The one behind it has a hole blown out of the top floor. It's on fire. He can hear sirens in the distance and another, lower throbbing noise. It's a helicopter.

He manages to turn his head. His targeting array lights up with flashing yellow dots.

He sits up, has to wait for the world to stop spinning. Glass and bits of rubble crunch as he pushes himself to his feet. He sways. There's no sign of the gunmen. Epsilon Holdings is silent.

A soft alarm chimes in his ears. The incoming dots flash. A few painful seconds later and a chipped, slightly scuffed Lamborghini idles on the grass. Inside, Hunter waits for the pain to recede enough for him to inch out, through the decorative shrubbery, and onto the road. By the time the cops screech around the corner, he's already two blocks down, limping away.

* * *

><p><em>What the hell was that?<em> Hunter thinks.

Those guys were not security. He's never heard of a security company that carried sub-machine guns or grenade launchers. They'd looked military, professional, not corporate rental cops. If he had any doubts that Epsilon Holdings is involved with Machination, those doubts are long gone.

_Shit._

Hunter speeds up and wonders if the rattling inside is a bad sign. He drifts into the left lane to get past a blue jeep. According to the map on his screen, there should be a highway entrance coming up in a few blocks. He's got to get out of Dallas for a little while, find someplace safe, someplace to plan his next move.

_Maybe Chicago_, he thinks. He glides back into the right lane. The ground drops away on either side and he can smell the river below. _Check the lake again, see if there's something I missed. They must have left something. I don't think Ratchet would have just—_

His proximity alert screeches to life. Hunter jumps and almost swerves into a minivan next to him. A dot flashes red.

"Weapons lock. Enemy targeting engaged," his visor says.

_**What.**_

The car ahead of him honks and veers to the side. A pair of headlights swerve into his lane. It's a car—red, low-slung, and it's headed right at him.

_Whoa!_

He slams his brakes, starts to turn, to get out of the way. The red car barrels at him. It doesn't even slow. Hunter tenses. At the last second, the red car pulls a high-speed 180. It slams into Hunter's side. He smashes into the railing. Hunter feels the metal groan and bend and then _tear_. The terrible feeling of weightlessness as he tips over, into empty air. And then the red car, falling right beside him, starts to unfold.

_Holy…_

A face emerges. Hunter doesn't get a good look. All he sees is the hate-filled snarl. And then they plunge into the river.

* * *

><p>Thanks to everyone who added this to their favorites or alerts! And thanks again to KayDeeBlu for her awesome beta work!<p>

Next chapter: Damaged


	3. Damaged

**Chapter Three: Damaged**

_- Five days ago -_

Night has fallen. The streets are empty and dark, the houses silent. A single streetlight hums at a corner, a swarm of bugs flit around it. Across the street sits an abandoned construction site. It's been blocked off by a wooden fence, but the wood is old and worn, rotted in a few places. Several planks are missing.

Sideswipe isn't sure what to make of it.

He grumbles to himself and runs another scan. Again, it comes up negative. He settles down on his tires.

Hidden amidst the usual organic slag—remnants of human machinery and transmissions bouncing through the atmosphere—he's picking up an energy signal: energon. It's faint, but it's there. What he's not picking up—not on his scanners, anyway—is a spark signature.

_The slag?_

Not on his scanners. Not by sensor. Nothing official. Not something another 'bot would detect. What he's picking up is a trace of himself, his other half: a ghost of Sunstreaker.

_Come on_, he thinks.

Sunny should have noticed him by now. He should be lighting up every, single Autobot scan for a hundred metras. Sunny has to know he's here.

The construction site is still and silent.

_The frag is he doing?_

A deca-cycle—three planetary rotations—he's been looking. It's taken Sideswipe that long to pinpoint his brother's signal and he finds him not buried in a human lab somewhere, not in Decepticon clutches, but here, in a settlement in the middle of nowhere, hiding in the dark next to a bunch of rusted machinery.

((Sunny?)) he comms.

_Come on, glitch-head_, he thinks. _You're starting to freak me out._

It's not just the radio silence, either. Everything about this is wrong. Why here? Why now? If Sunstreaker has been here this whole time, why hadn't he contacted anyone? Why hadn't he set out a distress signal when he escaped?

Sunstreaker's presence should be lighting up in Sideswipe's mind like a nuclear fragging detonation. He should be able to _see_ where Sunny is.

But he can't. Sunny is barely there, a whisper, a _suggestion_.

And Sideswipe needs to know _why_.

He eases into the street.

There are no humans out to see him. The whole neighborhood is quiet, the natives in recharge. He makes no sound as he comes to a stop outside the fence. His headlights cast long shadows through the missing slats. Light glimmers on standing pools of water and a collapsed pile of metal beams.

Nothing stirs.

((Last chance, bro,)) he says.

No response.

_Fine._

The fence is held shut with a locked chain threaded through two boards. Sideswipe digs his tires in and charges. Wood breaks over his hood, pieces go flying; the gate pops clean off and lands about a metra away in a cloud of dust. And then he's in.

The main structure is half-finished. Rusted metal reaches up to the sky. The lower section has walls, dotted with small squares leading into the empty darkness inside. A small hill of gravel leans against some sort of digging rig. Piles of building material are stacked here and there—more wood, warped and curved into bows; a set of concrete tubes as big around as his thigh; thin, ridged lengths of steel. And there, tucked into the gloom beneath a crumbling awning, is a yellow car.

Sideswipe knows that shade. He'd know it blinded.

"Sunny!" he says.

Sunny doesn't move.

Sideswipe starts forward. The ground is pockmarked with craters and sink holes. He thinks better of it about halfway across.

_Ah, frag it. It's not like there's anyone to see me._

He transforms. Arms shift into place to push him up onto two legs. Before he's done, before he's even got hands, he's walking toward his brother.

"Sunshine!" he says. He's grinning. He's lifting a rearranging hand to wave.

A flurry of movement as Sunstreaker's back splits apart and his missile launchers fold out.

"Get away from me!" Sunny says. Only it's not Sunny's voice.

Sideswipe freezes.

Sunny inches back, creeps closer to the building. His launchers are trained right on Sideswipe. He can feel his brother's targeting systems locked on.

"Whoa," he says. "Sunstreaker, calm down. It's me. It's Sideswipe."

"I don't' care who the fuck you are!" Sunny says. "You stay _away_ from me."

"Easy. I'm not gonna hurt you. You _know_ that. Just… just put those away, will you?"

"The hell I don't. You take one more step and I'll blow your goddamn head off."

Something cold and sickening twists around in Sideswipe.

"Hey," he says. "It's okay. Sunny, it's me. It's okay. Listen—"

Sunny sinks on his tires.

"Listen to me," Sideswipe says. "You're not making a lot of sense right now. Please. I just, I want to talk to you, alright? Just calm down. Put those—"

Sideswipe has stared death in the face more times than he can count. He's stared down his brother and those launchers once before. It's not something he ever wanted to do again.

A bright flash. A burst of smoke. Sideswipe drops to the left as a missile roars overhead. Heat washes over the back of his head. A grinding cough and he looks up and sees Sunny's tires spinning in the gravel. He's running.

"Sunstreaker!"

He won't catch him. Not on four wheels, not now.

Sideswipe's jet-pack ignites. Flames lick the back of his legs. He leaps up, kicks it into full throttle, and takes to the air.

The launchers swivel. Three missiles fire.

He tucks his limbs in and spins to the right. Too late. Two of them streak past. But the third…

The explosion bats him out of the sky. He plows into the ground, skidding, bouncing, ripping gouges out of the dirt. He smacks into the pile of concrete tubes. He lays there for a moment, trying to figure out if his arms still work.

Spinning tires. A flash of yellow as Sunstreaker makes a break for the open gate.

Sideswipe pushes himself up in a pile of debris. One of the tubes rolls off his chest. He shakes his head. The armor on his back shifts. His ion cannon folds out, lifts up, and settles on his left shoulder. The barrel spins, the weapon hums. Sideswipe takes careful aim.

A hot, blue beam shoots out. It hits the ground a metra in front of Sunny. It burns a trench into the dirt. Sunny fishtails and swerves. Then Sideswipe is up, out of the hole, and racing toward his brother. Before Sunny can right himself, before he can take off again, Sideswipe bends low and hits him.

He catches him in the undercarriage. Sunny's own momentum carries him into the air and flips him up. He crashes onto his side, rolls onto his roof.

For a moment, neither of them moves.

_What?_ Sideswipe thinks. _He didn't catch himself. Why didn't he catch himself? Something's wrong._

Sunstreaker has always been fast and precise. He should have been able to catch himself. He should have transformed, rolled with it, landed on his tires or even onto legs.

Sunny explodes into transformation. His car form falls apart and rearranges into arms and legs, hands and feet, a chest, a head. Those ridiculous head-fins; Sideswipe can't help the smile he feels tugging on his face when those stupid sensor-arrays slide up onto Sunny's head.

"Finally," Sideswipe says. Sunstreaker rolls onto his knees, his back to Sideswipe. He picks himself up. "Now, you mind telling me what…"

Sunny turns. Sideswipe's words fall out of his mouth. That sickening twist inside him punches him right through the chest.

"Sunny," he says. "What… what happened?"

His face is gone, replaced with some horrible imitation, a mockery. Rigid pieces sit where features should go. There are gaps in between, places where he can see past his brother's face, into his head.

"I told you to stay away from me," Sunny says. "But I guess you couldn't do that, could you?"

His arm changes. He pulls out his pulse rifle and aims it at Sideswipe.

"Say goodbye, robot," Sunny says.

It's wrong. All of it. Not just Sunny's face but his voice, the way he moves, the way Sideswipe _can't sense him_.

_What did they do to him?_

Sideswipes' fingers dig into his palm. He's shaking. Sunstreaker's rifle whines.

Someone… someone has done something to his brother. Someone has hurt him. Someone is going to _pay_.

Sideswipe's fist catches Sunny under the chin. His head snaps back. Then Sideswipe is on him. They both go down. Sunny flails. His fingers dig into Sideswipe's face, almost take out an optic. Sideswipe grunts and wrenches his brother's hand down. He wraps his legs around his torso, pinning Sunny's arms to his sides.

Sunny shouts and curses. Sideswipe ignores it.

Sunny is better on his feet—not that Sideswipe will ever admit that to anyone—but on the ground, in a close-up grapple where speed doesn't count as much, Sideswipe's greater strength gives him the advantage. He pins Sunny against his chest. The top of his brother's helm rests just below Sideswipe's chin.

He has to know. Sunny doesn't recognize him, doesn't even seem to realize he's an Autobot. Sideswipe needs to know why.

There's only one way to get information out of an uncooperative 'bot.

"Sorry," Sideswipe says, "but this is for your own good."

He tilts Sunny's head forward, exposing the data-port hidden beneath his helm. Sideswipe's hand shifts—fingers slide back as a data-jack extends from his wrist. Before Sunny can thrash or snarl, Sideswipe plugs in.

Their worlds start to meld. Sideswipe starts to sink into the familiar territory of his brother's mind. And then Sunny screams.

* * *

><p><em>- Present Day -<em>

The control room doors hiss open and Sideswipe trudges in dripping river water. The hall lights come on automatically. He moves aft, dragging his cargo behind him. Jetfire was a scientist—his ship contains a top-notch lab. This is where Sideswipe goes.

There's one medical berth in the room. He hefts his cargo up, onto it, and activates the restraints. The sides of the berth jumble out and latch onto arms and legs. It's not going anywhere.

The thing groans. Its fingers twitch. Its optic covers flicker and power up. For a moment, it lays there and Sideswipe can hear its optics moving as it looks around.

"Ugh," it says. It tries to lift an arm. The restraints catch it. The thing pauses and then says, "Oh god. Not again."

Sideswipe doesn't respond; not yet. He lets it thrash a bit, lets it feel just how stuck it is, lets the situation really sink in. Only after the back of its head thunks on the table and it shuts up does he move away from the wall. The moment he takes a step the thing's head whips toward him.

"Hello?" it says.

Sideswipe is careful to keep his gaze on the façade of a face. He doesn't look at its hands, he doesn't look at the fins, he doesn't look to the chest where the Autobot symbol should be.

"Who are you?" the thing says. "Where am I?"

He circles, watching its optics track him as he moves around and comes to a stop at its side. He waits, lets it get a good look at him, and then leans in.

The face doesn't move. Sideswipe can see no expression in it, no emotion. Only the flicker of movement behind glowing optic covers.

"What am I doing here?" it says.

Sideswipe straightens. The restraints creak as the thing tries to track him.

"You're a Headmaster, right?" Sideswipe says.

For a long moment the thing doesn't answer. Then it says, "I guess."

"You guess?"

"Yeah," it says. "I guess. Who are you? How did you find me? Where are we?"

The thing pulls at the restraints again. It thrashes a few times. Sideswipe waits. After a few kliks it slumps.

"You've talked to other Headmasters?" it says.

"A few."

"Where? _When_? I didn't know there were any more."

Sideswipe doesn't even try to hide his grin when he says, "There aren't."

He doesn't have to say "anymore." The way it stills tells him that it knows exactly what he means.

"Here's the deal," he says. "I've got a few questions for you. All you have to do is answer them, capiche?"

"And then what?" it says.

"That all depends on what kind of mood I'm in. You cooperate and it'll make me happy. You don't, not so much."

It stares.

"Question one," he says. "Where's your other base?"

"I don't know what you mean," it says. "What other base? In Florida—"

"_I'm not talking about that slag-heap in Florida_," he says.

He stops and forces himself to ease back. He pries his fingers away from the edge of the table and carefully re-folding his arms. He resumes walking. "That warehouse is gone. There's nothing left. I want to know where the rest of you were supposed to go afterward."

"Wait, slow down," the thing says. "The warehouse is gone? When?"

"Doesn't matter. Answer the question."

"I… I don't know. My memory is kind of messed up—"

"Then you'd better start clearing it."

"Look," the thing says. "I'm not what you think I am. I'm not one of them. I'm not part of Machination."

Sideswipe twitches.

"Please, you have to believe me," it says. "My name is Hunter O'Nion. I'm a… I _was_ a human. I was with the Autobots here, on earth. One of them, Ratchet, he rescued me and two others and brought us to his ship. But then Ironhide and Sunstreaker—"

Sideswipe swings his arm before he has a chance to register it. His fist slams the thing's arm just above the wrist. Armor shatters. Something inside cracks. The thing screams and bucks up against the restraints.

"Don't say that name!" Sideswipe says. "Don't you _dare_ say it!"

He has no idea if it hears him. It's too busy writhing and making agonized little screeching noises. Sideswipe takes two steps back and offlines his optics.

"See?" he says. "Not happy."

"Fuck!" the thing says. "You fucking psycho! What the _fuck_ was that for?"

He powers his optics back up. "I told you to answer the question. Not give me your sob story."

"It's not a sob story! I was with—I was captured too. _They_ did this to me. _Machination_ did this."

"You think I care?"

The thing struggles, arches up, off the table. "Damnit, I don't know anything! I was a goddamn guinea pig. They didn't tell me anything; they just cut me up, turned me into this!"

Sideswipe grabs the thing's head and slams it against the table.

"You've got five seconds before I lose my patience," he says.

"I. Don't. Know. Anything," it says.

"One."

"Jesus Christ, _listen_ to me!"

"Two."

"I'm after them, too. I broke out, I escaped—"

"Three."

"They tried to kill me. Right before you tackled me off that bridge—"

"Four."

"You _stupid_ asshole! Just stop and listen to me for two—"

"Five," Sideswipe says.

"Argh!" the thing says as Sideswipe lets it go. "_Please_. I'm their enemy, too. I want to take them down just as much as you do. Please, listen to me. They had me there, at that place in Florida. They tried to brainwash me but I got out and I think they did something, I think they tried to stop me and I think that's why I can't remember anything last week. And just now, just before you brought me here, I think they tried to kill me. It—what are you doing?"

Sideswipe has stepped around to stand behind it. While the thing has been babbling, he's been fiddling with the controls. The edge of the berth folds in, under itself, leaving the back of the head bare.

"Hey," the thing says.

His tanks churn. He shakes his hands a few times and tries to stop himself from cringing. Then he grabs the head with one hand and tilts it up.

"_What are you doing_?" it says.

His right hand reformats. He lines the data-jack up to the port. He can't stop the shudder that runs through him.

He plugs in.

The thing on the table convulses. It lets out a garbled scream. Sideswipe cuts power to his audios.

It takes a moment to merge. The organic mind is too different, too fluid, it doesn't think right and it takes a while for Sideswipe to orient himself enough to navigate.

His first impression is panic. The fragile mind of the meat-bag is not meant for this. He detects a spike of electrical impulses in the thing's squishy head. He only has a few kliks before the disruption becomes too much and it all goes haywire.

A smell. The organic mind identifies it as cinnamon. Sideswipe sees the face of another organic with long, orange-red fibers growing from its head.

_Megan_, the thing identifies. _Sibling. Sister._

Sideswipe backs out of that memory. He moves somewhere else, somewhere—

—_screamed as the jet screeched overhead. He grabbed the oh-shit handle over the door and wondered whether the ambulance could feel it. Suddenly, Ratchet swerved. Something long and silver streaked past the window. The side of the road blew apart._

_Verity screamed in his ear and he tried to pull away but Ratchet veered to the left and the girl was thrown against him, mashing him to the window. He—_

—"_That'll be nine dollars," he said. He shifted from one foot to the other as the man dug around in his wallet. The man—_

—_**season one, episode ten, Fallen Angel. An alien crashes in Wisconsin. Mulder tries to get in to see it alone.**_

_He could hear a high-pitched whir. It sounded like a dental drill. He couldn't move. His arms and legs were lead weights. He couldn't open his eyes. Everything was fuzzy. He thought he could hear voices, three men, but he couldn't understand what they were saying._

_Someone tugged on his leg. He felt no pain but he could tell something was wrong. Another tug, this one harder, and something popped in his hip. Terrible pressure and then… nothing._

_**Season one, episode eleven, Eve. The government sets up a secret program called the 'Litchfield Experiment' to create super-soldiers**__—_

—"_Awestruck" wouldn't be accurate. This went beyond that. This was change-your-pants __**awesome**__. The robots were __**huge**__; two-stories tall. And even though they had what could only be weapons pointed at them, Hunter couldn't keep the grin off his face. He—_

"—_where to?" Sunstreaker said._

_Hunter stared out through the window at the trees rushing past. He knew he was moping. He knew he should stop it; he was acting like a little kid. It was hard, though, when he saw the sign up ahead and the knowledge that he was leaving, going back to everything he'd tried so hard to get away from crashed down on him._

"_Tulsa," he said. "Oklahoma."_

"_What's there?" Sunstreaker said._

_Hunter sighed. "My life."—_

—_couldn't think about it. Don't think about it._

_He looked up at the head hanging from the ceiling and tried not to wince. Sunstreaker kept fading in and out, his words slurred, his gaze distant. Hunter wondered how he could still be alive._

_Oh god, oh __**god**__, he thought. This is wrong. This is so wrong._

_He wanted to cry. He wanted to scream. He wanted to start throwing things. But he couldn't. He could see the room on the other side of the glass, could see the technicians gathered around a monitor, watching Wheeljack being chased by Headmasters. They were laughing and cheering. He had to get out. He had to find Ratchet and the others, had to get Sunstreaker out of there. But how? How was he supposed to—_

—_stepped into the machine in the wall. He heard a rapid clicking and a deep thrum that made his teeth vibrate. A blast of cold air washed over him. Clamps folded over his arms and legs and he swallowed and looked up at Sunstreaker._

"_Ah… anything else I should know?" he said._

_Sunstreaker didn't answer right away. He stared into the dark corner of the room. _

"_Yeah," he said. "It's painful."_

_Hunter's stomach dropped out. "Oh great. Now he tells me."—_

Sideswipe trips over something. He loses himself for a moment and the squishy's thoughts swirl around him. He bats them away, starts to retrace his steps. It takes longer than it should; he can sense the thing's systems starting to malfunction as its brain patterns begin to scramble.

_What is that_? he thinks.

There's something embedded in there, a solid object stuck in the mass of chaotic, organic memories. Sideswipe gives it an experimental jab and, to his surprise, it opens up.

It's a data file.

Among the intangible stuff that is the human Hunter O'Nion, a new presence bubbles up and takes form. This is solid. This is warm. This is painfully familiar.

"Sunny?" Sideswipe says.

In Hunter's mind, Sunstreaker whispers, "Hey, Sideswipe."

His legs give out. Pain jolts up his knees as he hits the floor and the world drops away.

* * *

><p>The phone is ringing.<p>

Dr. Paul Berkman lifts his head, blinks, and peers at the glowing numbers of the clock on the nightstand. He grunts and lifts himself up on one elbow, reaches over to grab the phone.

"Hello?" he says. His voice comes out rough. He coughs and says, "This is Berkman."

"Sir?" he doesn't recognize the voice at first. It's not until the man is on his third sentence that it clicks.

"Whoa, whoa," Dr. Berkman says. "Hold on, slow down. Johnson, right?"

"Uh, yes sir," Johnson says.

"Okay, would you repeat that last bit a little slower this time?"

Thirty minutes later, he storms down a hallway in a sweatshirt and the pants he'd worn the night before. He bangs through a set of doors into a bustling control room. Technicians scurry along a row of monitors against the far wall. The air is filled with voices. Dr. Berkman spots Johnson almost immediately and, to the assistant's credit, the man drops what he's doing and makes a beeline for Dr. Berkman.

"It started about thirty-five minutes ago," he says, pulling out a smudged piece of paper. It's still warm from the printer. Dr. Berkman ignores it and brushes past him, over to one of the computers facing a large window and a dark room beyond. "We haven't figured out what started it or what, exactly, it _is_."

Dr. Berkman waves him off. He pulls his glasses out and studies the monitor. It shows a sharp spike in activity. Though the item in the darkened room isn't moving—it hasn't for the last two weeks—it's clearly doing something.

"Could it be broadcasting?" Johnson says.

"No," Dr. Berkman says. "We've got all frequencies blocked. There's no way this thing is talking to anyone."

"Then what—"

"I don't know. Has anyone contacted Mr. Dante yet?"

"He said he's on his way," a woman says.

Dr. Berkman nods and stares through the window. The only source of light within comes from the glowing pink lines running up through a pedestal. The room is empty, save for the single object inside.

"What are you doing?" he wonders aloud.

Enclosed in the room, the robotic head is silent.

* * *

><p>Thanks again to everyone who added this to their favorites. And thanks to Starfire201 and lildevchick for taking the time to review. You probably do have an idea of how much that means to me. Another thanks to KayDeeBlu for making sure I didn't embarrass myself with this chapter.<p>

Next chapter: No Choice


	4. No Choice

**Chapter Four: No Choice**

Before he opens his eyes, before anything else registers, Hunter feels the grinding, ugly ache. It's everywhere. All of his limbs, both the robotic shell and the cyborg body within. His chest. His back. His _head_. Christ, his head.

His thoughts are sluggish. He feels like he's floating. He knows his name, he knows who and what he is; it's the where and the why part that he can't quite remember.

The visor is dark; it flickers once, twice, and then powers up. He's looking at a ceiling of some sort, though he's not sure because it looks more like an abstract collage than anything else. The light is a strange, yellow-green. The ceiling tiles—if they can be called that—are put together like a bunch of asymmetrical puzzle pieces. Hunter stares at it for a while, trying to sort out the shapes in his head, trying to figure it out, waiting for the pain to die down enough for him to move.

It's not until he hears a soft hiss that he thinks to turn his head. The room takes a second to catch up with his eyes. It takes a few more seconds to figure out what he's looking at, like his brain is trying to realign itself. He sees red and black and silver. Then shapes begin to take form and he recognizes an arm, two arms, both folded over a chest.

Hunter bolts upright. Unfortunately, the edge of the table is right there and the next thing he knows, he slips off the edge and crashes to the floor. His teeth clack together. He lays there, stunned, for ten seconds before his brain reasserts itself.

He's not tied down.

"Huh?" he says. Not the smartest thing to say. Not the smartest thing to do, but a quick glance shows that the Transformer hasn't moved.

He stops. His vision keeps fading in and out, but he can make out the thing's legs, its feet still planted on the ground. It's just _sitting_ there.

He can't decide if that's a good thing or not.

_Did it fall asleep?_ he thinks.

"That had to hurt."

Hunter jumps. The Transformer's eyes are lit up and staring at him. It looks like… it's smiling at him. It's _laughing_ at him.

He blinks.

The Transformer cocks its head. It's perched on what Hunter can only call an over-sized, metal barstool. It makes no move toward him; just watches him. The teenager has been around Autobots long enough to recognize the amused glint to its eyes.

"I'm not gonna hurt you," it says.

He doesn't look down at his busted arm. The Transformer does, though, and Hunter swears it winces. Its shoulders slump. It slides off the stool.

Hunter starts to scramble away. His arm flares up in white-hot agony and he collapses. The Transformer freezes. It opens its mouth but no words come out.

Hunter eyeballs the door and calculates whether he can get there before the Transformer can catch him.

"It's 'Hunter,' right?"

Hunter looks at it.

"Look, I'm… that was… I'm sorry, okay?" it says. After a few seconds of silence, it says, "My name's Sideswipe."

They stare at each other. The Transformer breaks gaze first. It turns and gestures to the table.

"Here," it says. "That can't feel too great. I'm no medic, but I can patch that up."

Hunter thinks he might throw up. The Transformer backs over to some kind of storage cabinet and opens it. If Hunter's going to make a break for it, now is the time.

He looks again to the door. He could probably make it. His captor doesn't appear interested in stopping him. It could all be a ruse, of course, but Hunter can't find a reason for it. He'd been tied down. The Transformer had him completely vulnerable. There's no reason to let him up, to apologize, to offer to repair him.

_Unless he's bat-shit crazy_.

If he left, what then? Assuming the Transformer doesn't go all wonky on him again and finish him off, he has nowhere to go. He can't see straight, let alone transform and drive away. He has no way to fix himself. His one clue, the only lead he had on Machination was a dead end.

This "Sideswipe" has supplies. He has knowledge. Hunter barks out a laugh before he can stop himself.

_My one ally is a maniac_, he thinks. One that's willing to patch him up, but still.

He realizes Sideswipe has stopped and is leaning back, staring at him.

"Guess I've got no choice," Hunter says.

Sideswipe shrugs. "You've always got choices. Some are just dumber than others."

Hunter snorts. He starts to climb back to his feet. He has to take slow, small steps because the ground rocks beneath his feet. Sideswipe nudges the door to the cabinet shut and gives Hunter a wide berth. He edges past him to grab some sort of wheeled cart. He sets a pile of stuff on it and pushes it over as Hunter hauls himself onto the table.

Sideswipe lifts a tool in one hand and Hunter can't help but compare it to a cattle prod.

"What's that for?" he says. Even he hears the sharp note in his voice.

"What, this?" Sideswipe says and raises the thing up. "It's a welder."

"A _what_?"

"It's a medical tool, I promise. I'll turn your receptors off. You won't feel a thing. Well, maybe a bit if heat, but nothing bad."

"Right," Hunter says. He tries to make himself relax.

_If he wanted to hurt you again, he would have. There's no reason for it now._

Sideswipe tinkers with the welder. He's facing him and for the first time, Hunter catches a glimpse of the symbol on his chest.

"Lay back," Sideswipe says.

Hunter knows that symbol. All of the Autobots wore it: a red face. Sideswipe's is etched into the glass of his windshield and it isn't red, but it's the same face.

"You're an Autobot?" Hunter says.

The tinkering stops. For a moment, Hunter doesn't think he's going to answer—he's staring at the welder, an unfamiliar expression on his face.

"Yeah," he says a few seconds later. He makes an odd, chuffing sound and when he looks at Hunter, that expression is gone. "Come on. You're losing energon. Lay back."

This time, Hunter only hesitates for a moment. He has to suppress a shudder as he finds himself flat on his back with the red alien looming over him again. If Sideswipe notices, he doesn't say anything.

Sideswipe reaches into Hunter's shoulder with some kind of tool. The burning in his arm cuts off.

"Whoa," Hunter says.

Sideswipe doesn't quite smile; his eyes tilt up in what Hunter recognizes as amusement, though. Hunter has seen that look on Wheeljack. He tries not to fidget.

Pressure settles on his lower arm. Sideswipe tugs at something. Hunter tilts his head up to find the red Autobot sticking a pair of oversized tweezers and some sort of twisty stick-thing into his arm.

"What's that?" he says.

"Snapped some lines," Sideswipe says. "If you're built like us, your systems could seal them on their own in a cycle or so. I'm hurrying it up."

"Oh. Is it bad?"

"Could be worse. This is a little leak. It's not enough to put you in stasis, but if it doesn't get sealed, you'll start to notice."

Sideswipe puts down the twisty stick and picks up the cattle prod. Hunter tenses. The Autobot sticks the tip in. A bright, orange light flares up. It's warm, hot even, but it doesn't actually hurt. It tingles.

"You said you weren't a medic," Hunter says. He's carefully _not_ watching Sideswipe work. "How do you know this stuff?"

Sideswipe shrugs and says, "When you get scrapped as often as I do, you pick up some things."

"You fight a lot?"

This time, the Autobot grins. "Yeah."

_Figures_.

After he'd crashed into the river he remembered the rush of bubbles, flailing around, wondering if robots could drown, and then a flashing, red warning on his visor and then… nothing. He hadn't even seen Sideswipe hit him.

The tingling in his arm gets worse. Pins and needles race up his shoulder.

"What did you do?" he says.

"Hmm?" Sideswipe says. "Oh. The main strut in your arm's cracked. You shouldn't—"

"No, not that. Earlier. You were in my head, weren't you?"

Sideswipe doesn't even look up. "Yes."

A minute passes. Then two. Hunter listened to the strange hissing noise of his arm being pieced back together.

"Why?" he says.

"I needed answers."

The orange glow dims and dies. Sideswipe pulls the cattle prod out and picks up a thin, silver sheet of metal.

"We can all do that," Sideswipe says. "It's called an 'interface.' It was designed so that medics could get in and access an off-lined patient's processor, stuff like that."

"It's a medical procedure?"

"Started off that way."

Hunter decides he doesn't want to know.

"Does it always hurt like that?" he says.

"No," Sideswipe says. He's placed the sheet over the gap in Hunter's arm and reaches for the cattle prod again. "Your processor isn't structured like ours. There are some… compatibility issues. I wouldn't have done it if there'd been any other way and I'm sorry."

The last bit comes out in a rush. Sideswipe hasn't looked away from his work once during the whole conversation and Hunter realizes that, aside from the occasional brush as he adjusts something, the red 'bot hasn't touched him.

"Where are Ratchet and the others?" he says.

Sideswipe's expression darkens. "They left."

Hunter tells himself that he's been expecting that. He's known something was wrong from the moment he'd gotten out of that _place_ in Tampa and tried to radio someone. His only reply had been static. And then, when he woke up in that impound lot in Georgia with a week of his life gone and tried again and got nothing. The day it took to get back to Chicago, driving in silence, utterly alone in his head, figuring out how to operate his enormous body without killing anyone and with no one to help him. It took him thirty minutes to find the right turn-off to get to the dock over Lake Michigan only to find it _wasn't there_ anymore.

He'd known something had happened. He'd known they must be gone.

_Verity, Jimmy… what happened to you guys?_

"Why?" he says. His voice breaks.

"Decepticon activity in another system. Prime though it was more urgent."

Hunter wants to get mad at the red Autobot. The way he oh-so-casually announces that the Autobots don't have time for some primitive back-water like earth. That the Decepticon invasion—because that's what was _going_ to happen; he'd been there, in that base in Oregon; he'd overheard enough to understand—of his planet, his people, wasn't important enough on the grand scale of things. Earth was doomed. All of humanity was screwed.

It's not Sideswipe's fault. It wasn't his decision. And Hunter understands, mostly. Their war is bigger than his little world. Still…

"So why are you here?" he says.

Sideswipe doesn't answer. He sets down the tweezers and the cattle prod. The silvery sheet of metal has been fused to Hunter's arm like some kind of metal band-aid.

"I'm looking for someone," Sideswipe says.

_Don't say that name!_

"Sunstreaker," Hunter says.

"Yeah."

He doesn't fly off the handle when Hunter says it. Hunter takes that as a good sign.

"Why?"

"Why what?" Sideswipe says.

"Why are you looking for him, for Sunstreaker? Did Optimus Prime send you?"

He recognizes the low grumble of Autobot laughter. This sounds bitter, though.

"No, he didn't," Sideswipe says. "I came here on my own."

"But… why?"

"He's my brother."

"Oh," Hunter says. Then the meaning of that sentence hits him and he looks down so fast he almost gives himself whiplash. "_What_?"

For the first time since he started working on him, Sideswipe looks at Hunter.

"He's my brother. My twin."

Inside the robotic head, Hunter's mouth is hanging open. He lays there and tries to figure out how to say, "Who-muh-wha" without sounding like an idiot.

"Now," Sideswipe says. "Any other injuries I should know about?"

* * *

><p>Hunter sits on the edge of the communications console in his smaller body, the one he refers to as his "cyborg" body, his squishy face pale and a little moist. Sideswipe wonders whether that's a normal—though gross—organic function or if something is wrong.<p>

He'd been shot with some kind of primitive projectile through the knee and in the right shoulder. The projectile—Hunter had called it a "bullet;" Sideswipe had called it a mess—had still been in his shoulder. It'd gotten lodged just beneath a transformation cog and had severed some sort of fluid line. Hunter's arm had been coated with the stuff—a dark, viscous goo.

He'd pried it out. Which hadn't been pleasant. Hunter's cyborg body wasn't wired like an Autobot. There were similarities, but not enough for Sideswipe to find his pain receptors. He'd had to do it with the human very much aware and awake.

"You okay?" Sideswipe says.

"Ugh," Hunter says. He sits with his lower legs dangling off the side, torso folded over his legs, his head tucked between his knees. "I think I'm gonna puke."

Sideswipe isn't sure what that means. He assumes it's bad.

The human looks up and catches Sideswipe staring. "Just… just gimme a minute."

Sideswipe shrugs and turns to his own console. The ship's communications have been up and running since he landed, some four planetary rotations ago. In that time, it's been scanning and downloading satellite transmissions and radio signals. He'd tried to program it to weed out the obvious slag, but the humans produce so much noise that even with those parameters, he has about a deca-cycle's worth of data to sift through.

_Primus. How has this planet stayed hidden as long as it has?_

"So, what now?"

Hunter has propped himself up with his elbows on his knees. He sways. Sideswipe leans over and reaches above him to tap the thin, transparent screen attached to the console. It lights up.

"We start looking," he says.

The screen breaks up into sixteen smaller boxes, each one flashing through a different file. Humans talking, driving their primitive vehicles, firing weapons at each other. Hunter squints at it.

"Is this… are we watching TV?" he says.

"Is that what you call your visual communications network?"

The human's soft facial plating scrunches up. He's silent for a nano-klik and then says, "Yeah. That's TV."

The human shakes his head and runs a hand down his face. His optical shutters lower.

"Why are we watching TV?"

"For information," Sideswipe says. "Your planet seems obsessed with it and I figured it would be the best place to start searching."

"We're gonna find Machination by watching CNN?"

Sideswipe shrugs. "I filtered out what I could. It's not my fault your species is so noisy."

"But that still leaves, like, a hundred channels. You're talking about thousands of hours of programming."

"You know this stuff better than I do. You don't have to watch everything, just go through and sort out the irrelevant data."

Hunter stares at the screen. The colors dance across his face.

"This is going to take forever," he says.

"Better get started, then."

The human glares at him. But he turns back. He raises a hand, his fingers hover over the screen.

"How do I work it? The other Autobots never let us into this section of their ship."

Not surprising. They'd been lucky to come aboard at all.

"Touch the portion of the screen you want to see. One tap enlarges it. Two taps shrinks it again. If you drag it toward my screen, it'll transfer it to me. Do that with anything you think is important."

"Olay," Hunter says. "That's easy."

"Easy is good. Comes in handy when you're being shot at."

The human falls silent. Sideswipe continues to sift through his own share.

It's a lot of information to dig through. Even with the human's help, it's enough to keep him occupied for a while. The problem is that he doesn't have that long.

_Slaggit, Sunny_, he thinks.

His brother could be a clever slag-head when he wanted to be. Placing a message in an organic processor… Sideswipe has never heard of that one, before. The human hadn't even known it was there.

_What the slag were you thinking?_

The message had been short. Sunny probably hadn't had a lot of time to make it. It was clear enough, however.

"Stay away," he'd said. "It's bigger than you think. Stay away."

Sideswipe wants to hit something. Maybe his brother.

_As if I'd really do that. Idiot._

"Oh god."

Sideswipe snaps out of his thoughts. He glances over to find Hunter staring at the display with what even Sideswipe recognizes as horror.

"Find something?" he says.

"I…" the human says. A small, pink appendage flicks out of its mouth. "I think this is Dallas."

The human has enlarged it to cover the entire screen. The footage is shaky. It shows a building, tall by human standards. The camera must be mounted on some sort of flying craft because it's circling around. It takes a moment for the damage to come into view.

A series of gashes have torn open the side of the building from top to bottom. A pile of debris lies in a heap against the base, next to a good-sized crater. Sideswipe catches glimpses of other rotor flying vehicles circling around and a swarm of blue-and-red flashing lights in the streets below.

"What's this?" he says, ignoring the human babble coming from the display.

"I did that," Hunter says. His voice is quiet. He's standing in front of Sideswipe, so the Autobot can't see his face, but he can see that he's swaying again.

"Huh," Sideswipe says.

"They said eight people died," the human says. He wobbles. Then he carefully lowers himself to sit on the console. "They… they got trapped when parts of the floors collapsed."

Sideswipe stares at the display and then at Hunter. The human pulls his legs in and sits curled up in a ball, his chin on his knees.

"You said this was a front for Machination, right?" Sideswipe says. "So a few of them got killed. So what?"

"So eight people are dead. They died because of _me_."

"They worked for Machination. This kind of thing is going to happen."

"That doesn't mean they're bad people! What if they just worked there, what if they have families, kids. _Shit_. This isn't… I can't…"

He looks back at the footage. The camera has changed, switched to one on the ground. The building is lit up from above and below. A human female stands in the front. Behind her are security vehicles and several big, red, boxy things with "Fire Department" written on the side. And off in the corner, he can see the front end of two large, dark vehicles with no markings of any kind.

Sideswipe leans in. They're no different from the other civilian vehicles except that Sideswipe can see a pack of humans climbing out. They're all dressed in dark suits. So are many of the camera-humans. But these ones are different.

Sideswipe has seen them before.

* * *

><p>Agent Seymour Simmons has the best job in the world. The travel, the adventure, the do-what-you-want-and-get-away-with-it-badge. He gets to see some of the most exotic locations on earth. He gets to play with the coolest toys. He's part of a small, privileged group of people with access to the most dangerous information on the planet. But sometimes, just sometimes, Simmons really hates his job.<p>

"They're saying what?" he says.

Around him is a scene of controlled chaos: police helicopters circle overhead to keep the media vultures at bay; the streets are packed with cop cars and ambulances and fire trucks. Men are running around with search-and-rescue dogs. The Dallas PD is doing everything in its power to keep the scene clear, keep it clean, which is getting more difficult as the crowds keep growing larger.

"They have a mayday call," Special Agent Liz Cantrell says. "According to eyewitness accounts, the helicopter—it's registered to, ah, a Houston-based company called Svensberg Security Investments. According to initial reports it was coming in for a landing on the smaller building when it dropped. The pilot managed to send a mayday call before it went down."

"A helicopter crash?" Simmons says. He turns, looks at the building, looks back to his team.

"They're saying it raked the side on the way down," Cantrell says.

He can see the wreckage, of course. Silver and blue ribbons of metal, all twisted and mangled, lie scattered all over the lawn. Part of the tail section sticks out of a heap of debris at the base of the building. The tail rotors are gone. Paramedics load something onto a wheeled stretcher. They're not moving in any kind of hurry.

"They've recovered the body of the pilot and it looks like one passenger," Special Agent Billy Perez says.

"We've been told that eight other people died inside," Cantrell says.

Simmons rocks back on his heels, his hands clasped behind his back.

"No one saw the yellow car?" he says.

Cantrell and Perez exchange a glance.

"No, sir," Perez says.

"Security footage?"

"We're waiting on the hard copy," Cantrell says.

Simmons narrows his eyes. He sighs. "Okay. Cantrell, Perez, I want you to stay here. I want to know the second we get a hold of that footage. You two keep an eye on things. Anything happens, _anything_, I want to know."

Both agents nod and turn away. Simmons watches them go. He eyeballs the scene for a few more seconds.

"Damn," he says.

Beside him, Special Agent Tom Salazar clears his throat.

"I know," Simmons says. "And I don't like it."

He grumbles again and starts toward the rental SUV. Salazar falls in beside him. They wait until they're past the yellow tape and the ring of cops. Simmons skirts a police cruiser and lifts a hand and says, "Keys."

Salazar blinks. Then he reaches into his pocket, pulls them out, and tosses them over. Simmons veers to the right, to the driver's side, and climbs in. He starts the engine and waits until Salazar shuts his own door. Then he reaches back, under the seat, and pulls out a small, black carrying case. He hands it to Salazar and pops the gears into reverse.

"You think it's bullshit?" Salazar says.

"You don't?" Simmons says. He backs out. "You won't pick up much of a signal from this distance, but it'll have to do. If an NBE was here, it had to leave a trail. That building should be hot."

Salazar pulls out a handheld radiation detector. He rolls the window down. Warm, muggy air billows into the car. He palms the detector and puts his hand on the sill.

Simmons eases into the throng of spectators, letting the blue and red lights on the SUV's grill do their job. It still takes longer than it should for him to reach the cross street. Salazar stares at the tiny, glowing screen. The GPS system mounted on the dashboard tells Simmons to turn left. He turns right, circles around the skyscraper. The street is blocked off and he has to flash his badge to get through.

The detector is silent.

"Must have gone the other way," Salazar says.

And then the box clicks.

Simmons can't look away from the road long enough to read what it says. Salazar solves the problem by saying, "Four RADs."

It's not a strong signal. It takes twelve RADs before a human being will notice anything, but there's only one thing that emits that kind of radiation and it isn't from Earth.

"Got it," Simmons says.

Salazar grins as he slips the detector back into the case and slides it under the seat. He rolls up the window. They reach another cross street and this time, Simons listens to the flashing GPS and takes a left, back toward the hotel.

"Okay," he says. "I want you to call headquarters. Tell them we have a priority one. I don't care how they do it, just get us in. We _need_ access. I'll get hold of Banacheck and get a team down here."

Salazar is dialing on his cell phone before Simmons finishes his first sentence. It's one a.m. Dallas time, two in D.C. but someone will answer the phone.

"Then you get Cantrell and Perez and let them know. We're going full-scale here."

Simmons can't keep the grin off his face. Two weeks. It's been two weeks since the NBEs went public with that little UFO stunt and since then, nothing has happened. Two weeks of silence. Two weeks of sitting around, monitoring newscasts and cell phone conversations and wondering if the apocalypse was just over the horizon. But that ends tonight. They have activity. They have a lead. And Simmons is right in the middle of it.

Sometimes, he really loves his job.

He notices movement out of the corner of his eye—Salazar thumbs the screen on the phone. He brings it back up to his ear.

"What?" Simmons says. "What is it?"

"I lost the signal."

Simmons rolls his eyes. He wants to turn on the radio, find something fun, something to match his mood.

_We got 'em. Oh, we got 'em._

"Huh."

Salazar stares at his phone.

"What now?" Simmons says.

Salazar shakes his head. "I dunno. Bad reception?"

"We're in the middle of Dallas. How can you get bad reception in the middle of a city? You sure you're dialing it right?"

"Yeah. It's programmed. The phone's not working.

"Use mine," Simmons says. He twists around and unclips his iPhone from his belt. Salazar takes it, touches the screen, and waits for a minute. Then he shakes his head.

"No. Nothing. It can't find a network."

"Let me see that."

He takes his eyes off the road for one second and reaches out to take the iPhone back. One second. Suddenly, Salazar throws his hands up. Simmons has enough time to see headlights.

Pale blue and a glimpse of a face behind a windshield. Then the world turns to flashes, broken images of lights and the sky spinning. Metal twisting. Something slams into his chest and the air whooshes out of his lungs. He can hear an unholy screeching. On some instinctual level he knows it's the sound of the car smashing, tearing.

Everything tilts.

The next thing Simmons knows, his head pounds and he can't breathe. He can't see anything. He can't open his eyes. He reaches up with his right hand only to find it brushes the floor.

_What?_

His arms are twisted up over his head, only they're on the ground, too. He's upside down.

He hears hissing and ticking and his blood thumping in his ears. He tries to move his left hand but white hot pain spikes through his shoulder. He drags his right hand across the ceiling, through what he knows must be shattered glass, and brings his fingers to his eyes.

His face is wet. His nose is tender. But his eyes feel fine; they're still there. It's blood, he realizes, blood in his eyes. He wipes at it and finally manages to crack one eye open.

He's staring through what's left of the windshield. Deflated airbags hang in the way. His vision wavers. His eyes water. He blinks a few times and tries to sniff but that hurts.

"Agh," he croaks.

Salazar, like Simmons, is hanging upside down, suspended from his seatbelt. He's not moving. The dashboard is crushed against his chest.

"Shit," Simmons says. He drags his arm through the glass again, hoping his suit sleeve will keep it from chewing up his skin, and paws at the unconscious agent. He's too far; he can't reach him. He's got to unbuckle himself.

Simmons pulls his left arm to his side. He hisses through his teeth. His shoulder hurts like hell. He wonders if he's broken something.

He doesn't have time to sit there and think about it. He fumbles for the seat belt clasp with his right hand. His fingers brush the button and it takes two tries for him to push it down far enough to release him.

He lands on his face. His vision explodes in black and twinkling specks of light.

_Oh yeah_, he thinks. _Definitely broken._

He wriggles and curses and swings his legs around the steering wheel. His feet bang against the door frame.

Salazar's face is dark with blood. He isn't moving, isn't making a sound, and even as Simmons reaches up to press his fingers against the man's neck, he knows it's too late.

Salazar is dead.

"Fuck," Simmons says. He falls back into the broken glass. For a moment he lays there, face throbbing, shoulder aching, and tries to breathe.

He has to get out of the car. He's got to call this in. He's got to get himself to a hospital. He's got to take care of Salazar. He's got to figure out what the hell just happened.

"Fuck."

Something thumps outside. It's hard to hear over the sound of the car sputtering and settling on its roof; it's not until it does it again that Simmons registers it.

_What the hell?_

The other car, the one that hit them. It sounds like someone is pounding, trying to get out.

_Oh, son of a bitch._

The driver must still be inside. Simmons hopes he is, because _someone_ is going to pay for this.

He kicks out the shattered remains of the window. The SUV pushes down. The frame buckles. Simmons shreds the back of his suit dragging himself out.

The SUV ended up on the side of the road, just shy of the sidewalk. He pulls himself up and braces himself against the undercarriage. The blue car—an old, beat-up pickup—is about twenty feet down the road, the cab facing away from him. Simmons hobbles toward it.

Two cars have stopped along the street. People have gotten out. The small handful of passengers are milling around but a couple of guys head in his direction.

He spots movement in the pickup. The driver's side door flies open. A figure stumbles out. He's on the opposite side of the truck so Simmons can't tell what he's doing until the man—he thinks it's a man, anyway—stands up. He looks over the warped bed of the pickup and his gaze meets Simmons's. In that instant, Simmons knows he's going to run.

"Hey!" he says.

The man bolts. Simmons reaches down, finds his gun on his belt, and takes off after him.

"Hey! Stop right there!"

People scream. The two good Samaritans back off, their hands raised. Simmons darts past them.

_It hurts, it hurts, oh __**fuck**__ it hurts!_

Every step jolts his shoulder. He can barely see. He keeps going, past the pickup, past clusters of huddled people.

The guy reaches the end of the block. He swings left and slips around the corner.

Simmons is going to lose him. He can already tell. He's breathing hard. His shoulder is on fire. He can feel himself tiring.

_Shit_.

By the time he gets to the corner and turns, the guy is gone. Simmons lowers the gun. Behind him, he can hear people babbling and the distant wail of sirens. He slides the gun back in its holster and leans against the brick wall, panting.

_Damn_, he thinks. He leans over and peers around the corner at the wreckage. _There's going to be so much paperwork._

* * *

><p>Thanks again to Starfire201 and lildevchick for their awesome reviews. A bigger helping of thanks to KayDeeBlu for her beta skills.<p>

Next chapter: Hi There


	5. Hi There

**Chapter Five: Hi There**

1:05 a.m.

Jerri Stephens glances away from the clock and checks the rearview mirrors. Two other cars are parked behind her. The streets are empty. The shops are dark.

_Where the hell is he?_ She's been sitting in the car for twenty minutes. The engine is off. The air is getting heavy; her shirt sticks to her skin. _This is stupid. That idiot should never have been put in charge._

If the guy doesn't show up in the next five minutes, she's going to call it a loss. She can hear sirens in the distance. Helicopters dart low between buildings to the west. She glances at the clock.

This is amateur work. Berkman has no clue what the hell he's doing. Sure, the guy is a terrific egghead, but that's just it: the man is an egghead. He has no business sticking his nose into ground operations.

_Ordering some two-bit assassination…please. Like no one will notice. Fucking asshole._

She sits in the stuffy car, sweat running between her shoulder blades, and eyeballs the key in the ignition.

A flutter of movement—her gaze darts to the mirror. Someone is walking down the sidewalk. She waits a few seconds, lets the guy get close, until she can see his shadowed face.

She sighs. It's him.

At first glance, the man looks like any other pedestrian wandering around downtown Dallas after midnight. He'd had the sense to change his outer clothing and clean his face, though he's walking with a limp.

Jerri waits until he's a few feet away before she leans over and cracks the passenger door. The guy steps off the sidewalk like he's expecting the ride and slides in. He's not even closed the door when Jerri starts the car and pulls out into the street.

She glances over without turning her head and says, "Put your seatbelt on."

The guy snorts and Jerri's sure she sees him roll his eyes, but he does what he's told.

"What happened?" she says.

"I nailed them," the guy says.

"And?"

"And what?"

"Did you get him?" she says.

"I got one of them."

Jerri's hands twitch.

"_Which_ one?" she says.

"I don't know."

This time, she does look at the guy. "What do you mean you _don't know_."

"It was dark, lady! I didn't get a good look. He pulled a fucking gun on me. I didn't stick around to find out if he was gonna use it."

Jerri stares straight ahead. She turns left at the next intersection. "But you're sure you got one of them?"

"Oh yeah," he says. She can hear the grin in his voice. "We plowed right through the passenger side. There's no way the dude could've survived."

"And your driver?"

"He didn't make it."

The little shit is still grinning. Jerri breathes through her nose and releases it slowly. She turns left again.

"Did anyone see you?" she says.

The guy snorts again. "A couple of people. But Dr. Berkman said that it wasn't gonna be a problem. He said you guys would take care of it."

Jerri nods.

"These implants are something else," the guy says. "Almost put my head through the windshield. But a few minutes later, nothing. Not even a fucking scar. I can't wait until they get me the upgrades."

"Mmm."

"I mean, it's not a big deal or nothing, right? We just go back and whack that other dude, right? Bim, bam, boom. Problem solved."

If course it isn't going to be that easy. The whole point of getting this loser—whatever his name is—those implants, of finding a suitable vehicle and driver, is to make it look like an accident. There can be no obvious attempts made on a federal agent. Especially this one. _Especially_ if he escaped alive.

The loser starts drumming his hands on his thighs. He stares out the window as he bobs his head. Jerri focuses on breathing. A right turn. The shops give way to larger warehouses. There's no traffic.

"So where're we headed, anyway?" the crony asks.

"A rendezvous."

"Oh. Nice. This is like a movie, you know? Fucking covert."

Jerri says nothing. Water glimmers ahead. She takes the next side street and pulls into a large parking lot next to a warehouse. The crony is still drumming away, faster now. She finds a nice, grassy area to the side and parks the car at the edge of the pavement, careful not to sink the tires into the turf. The crony looks out at the scruffy trees and the river beyond.

"So, what, we wait here? That's cool. You mind if I turn on the radio?"

He doesn't wait for Jerri to respond, he just leans forward and starts to play with the dials.

Jerri doesn't stop him. She reaches down into the center console with her right hand. At the same time, she reaches over with her left hand and pushes a button to roll down the passenger window.

"Dude," the crony says. He turns towards her, his mouth open. He stops when he sees the barrel of the silencer an inch from his face. "What?"

Jerri fires once, twice. The crony jerks and then slumps against the door, his head lolling out of the window. Jerri pulls out a cloth and wipes down the weapon. She unscrews the silencer and opens the glove compartment. Both gun and silencer go inside. Then she drives forward a few feet, parks the car, and pops the trunk.

Inside are a squirt bottle, some latex gloves, and a few rags. It's crude, but it's a start. She doesn't have to do a thorough clean herself; the guys back at headquarters will do that for her. She just has to get the most obvious parts off the car, the spatters on the side of the door, for instance.

It doesn't take her very long. Soon enough, the crony is stretched out on the seat, his head partially covered with a blanket. To anyone passing by, he looks asleep.

Jerri stuffs the dirty rags and gloves into a garbage bag and puts it all in the trunk. She climbs back in and starts the car. Music blasts through the speakers. Jerri glances down at the glowing display. She turns the radio off.

* * *

><p>"So this is it, huh?" Hunter says.<p>

He sits to Sideswipe's left. The air is warm and wet. The parking lot is quiet. Most of the humans seem to be inside the building, settling down for the night. Sideswipe runs another scan to be sure.

"You're sure this is where he's staying?" Hunter says.

"Yeah," Sideswipe says.

Human security is a joke. It takes a thought for him to find and hack the network inside. He sorts through the data and finds the one he's looking for.

"Seymour Simmons, room 407. Booked for two nights. He's paying with a Mastercard. You want the account number?"

"No," Hunter says. "I'm good."

"Okay then."

"So, what do we do now?"

The humans in Dallas are the same ones Sideswipe saw in Chicago, poking around the Headmaster named Timothy. Same type of vehicles. Same suits. It took a few kliks to identify them and Sideswipe had to hack what Hunter had referred to as "the National _Defense Network_?" to do it.

They're registered with a Federal Bureau of Investigation. This particular team is headed by an Agent listed as Seymour Simmons. And he's booked into the Sheraton Suites in Dallas, Texas.

Unfortunately, Agent Simmons isn't _there_. The logs for the lock on his room show that the door had been opened at 10:18 that morning.

"You've got to get into that room," he says.

"_What_?" Hunter says. "Me? Why me?"

"Unless you want to see _me _to try."

"Don't you have that holo-matter thing?"

"I'd have to get a lot closer to the building if I wanted to use it to interact with anything. I don't think it'd reach the fourth floor."

Hunter is silent.

"Go up and see what you can find in there. If there's a chance that these humans are after Machination, we need to know. Whatever they have, we need it."

The yellow vehicle next to him sinks down on its tires.

"Oh man," Hunter says. "Where am I supposed to stash the rest of me?"

* * *

><p><em>This is the second time in two days that I'm breaking into a building<em>, Hunter thinks. _What the hell is wrong with me?_

He's out of options. He can't just waltz into a police station. The Autobots have left earth. The only person he has on his side now might just be psychotic.

_God, this is so messed up._

Sideswipe is genial enough. He'd patched Hunter up and pried the bullet from his knee. But something is off. He can't explain it, can't define it. Something in him knows the 'bot is about two French fries short of a happy meal.

Not now, of course. Now, he's sitting all quiet in the parking lot as Hunter creeps through rows of cars. But it's still there, shifting just beneath the surface.

_Twins. How does a robot have a twin?_

Light pours out of the glass door in the side of the building. Inside, he can see carpeted stairs.

_Bingo._

He eases up, back to the wall, and peers in. The stairs are deserted. No one will see him. There's just one problem.

"Shit."

The door has one of those card-swipe locks. He tugs at it but the door doesn't budge.

((What's the problem?))

Hunter almost swallows his tongue. Sideswipe's "voice" blares in his ears as if he's standing right there. Hunter turns to the parking lot and spies the red car where he left him.

"Door's locked," Hunter says as loud as he dares.

A short pause, then, ((There.))

The door clicks. Hunter looks down, sees the blinking light flashing green.

"Oh," he says.

((I'll get the room unlocked too. Hurry up.))

"Yeah. I'm going."

Climbing four stories and he's not even tired. He pauses outside the door for the fourth floor and peers in. He can see 407 about halfway down the hall.

((What's the hold up?)) Sideswipe says.

"Making sure I don't scare the bejesus out of some family or something," Hunter says.

((You're clear. Go now.))

_God, he's impatient._

True to his word, Sideswipe has the room unlocked. Hunter slips inside and eases the door shut behind him. It's a standard hotel room. To his right, a sliding closet door, to the left, a nook with a sink and a mirror; the dark space of the bathroom branches off. The single bed is made, the blankets tucked in and untouched. He sees nothing laying on the nightstands or the small dresser. Nothing on the little table. No soda cans or paper coffee cups. Nothing in the trashcan at all. It looks deserted.

_Did I get the right room_?

"I don't think he's been here," Hunter says. Light sweeps in through the window. An engine rumbles down below.

((Why?)) Sideswipe says.

"This place is empty," Hunter says, poking around the bed. "No bags, no garbage, no dirty clothes. No nothing."

The mech makes a strange, buzzing noise that the teen recognizes as the Autobot's language. He's pretty sure that one is a swear word.

((You're sure?)) Sideswipe says. ((There's nothing there? At all?))

"Yeah. He must have taken his stuff with him. Wait a minute… scratch that."

Tucked up underneath the edge of the bed on the far side, right underneath the frilly drape things, Hunter spots a black bag. He pulls it out and unzips the top. "Gotcha."

((What? What is it?)) Sideswipe says.

"His bag. Hold on."

Inside, Hunter finds some rolled up socks, a pair of pants, and some ridiculous Hawaiian silk boxers.

Down below, he hears a door open. A car chimes a couple of times and falls silent.

The main prize is behind the clothes, strapped to the side of the bag: Agent Simmons's laptop.

"Hey Sideswipe," he says. "I got—"

((You've got company!))

For two milliseconds, Hunter stands there. "What?"

((The human. He's back, inside the building. Get out of there. Now!))

_Oh shit._

He picks up faint, thumping vibrations on the stairs. The swish of the door down the hall opening, footsteps on the carpet.

_Shit, shit! Where do I go?_

The window.

Hunter drops the bag and lunges, misjudges his speed and slams into the wall. The window rattles. There's an air-conditioner built into the sill. The window is a flat plane of glass. It doesn't open. He can break it, if he wants to create a mess and tip off the _federal agent_ that someone was in his room.

The footsteps stop right outside the door. He hears a click. The handles start to turn.

_Fuck!_

He dives behind the bed, wedges himself against the wooden frame. He hears the door open, then shut. Seconds later, the closet slides open. Something rattles. Hunter doesn't move. For the first time, he's glad he doesn't have to breathe.

Footsteps, headed toward him. He tenses, prepares to jump up and run and hope he doesn't get shot again. The bed springs squeak. Hunter senses a shift in the mattress. The man sighs.

Hunter risks moving, bits of machinery that he tries very hard not to think about whir and twist around in his neck and he cranes his head back to peer over the edge of the bed. And almost has a heart attack.

All Agent Simmons has to do is turn two inches to the left and Hunter's cover is blown. He's hunched down. His left arm is in some sort of sling.

_What the hell happened to him?_ Hunter wonders. _He looked fine on the news yesterday._

The man winces. He eases forward and stands. Hunter ducks back, wishing he could sink through the floor. He waits, listens as the footsteps, muffled and heavy, putz around.

_And I'm hiding under the bed. Wow, it would suck so bad to get caught like this._

Moments later, the bathroom door closes. Hunter counts to five and eases up on one elbow. He can just make out the edge of the door reflected in the mirror. The door is shut, the light inside on. This is his chance to bail.

"Sideswipe?" he breathes.

((What?))

"Is the hallway clear now?"

Sideswipe doesn't answer right away. Then he says, ((Yeah. Go for it.))

Hunter rolls to his feet. He pads across the floor, passing the bed and TV stand. He's right next to the closet when he hears the toilet flush.

_Crap_.

The closet is on his left. He slides it open and ducks inside, eases it shut just as the bathroom door opens. Simmons walks out. Nestled up against a few plastic hangers and a suit jacket that smells of sweat and aftershave, Hunter peers through the crack between the two sliding doors. Agent Simmons walks back over to the bed, sets his car keys and cell phone on the dresser. He leans over the bed—

_Thank god I moved_, Hunter thinks.

—and pulls his bag up. He rummages through it for a few seconds and pulls out some clothes. He turns back towards Hunter.

Hunter winces.

Even though half of the man's face is shaded by the low light of the hotel room, Hunter can still see the white tape across the bridge of his nose and the mass of bruising under each eye. Simmons has stitches just beneath his eyebrow, too. Someone has messed him up good.

Then he's walking past, disappearing into the bathroom. Two seconds later and the shower comes on.

Hunter waits, makes sure that he's staying in there and not going to pop back out. He doesn't move, doesn't make a sound as he watches a shadow move in the light underneath the door. Then that shadow disappears. Agent Simmons starts to hum, just audible over the sound of the water.

_Go_, Hunter thinks.

He eases out, tiptoes the last few feet to the door, and pauses. The agent is in the shower. It's unlikely that he's going to come back out in the next few minutes and who knows if they'll get another chance to get in here. The man could be packing up and leaving tomorrow morning and then what will they do?

_What will Sideswipe do?_

Agent Simmons's bag is still on the bed where he left it. If Hunter can get the laptop, maybe they can find what they need and Sideswipe won't do something… crazy.

The shower is running. Simmons is still humming what Hunter thinks might be "Hotel California."

He has to peel away the Velcro straps inside to pull the laptop out. Hunter looks down at himself, trying to find someplace to stash the thing. He settles for tucking it under his arm.

_Should I take the phone, too?_ he thinks and feels a pang of remorse. _First I break into the guy's room, now I'm stealing his stuff. Way to go, Hunter._

He'll have to find a way to return it. Once Sideswipe is done with it, he should be able to look up the guy's address and they can mail it back or something.

"Hey, Sideswipe, do you think…"

Something pings in Hunter's brain, just below the conscious level. It takes a second for him to realize that Hotel California has stopped. He feels a waft of humid air. His stomach drops out and he starts to turn—

"Don't. Move."

Simmons is standing right there, five feet away, fully dressed. He's got a gun pointed at Hunter's face. The agent's lips pull back in a nasty grin.

"Hi there," he says.

* * *

><p>Thanks again to Starfire201 and lildevchick for their reviews. It makes my day to see that notice in my inbox. Hopefully I won't let you guys down. And this chapter would have been a lot more unwieldy if it weren't for KayDeeBlu and her wonderful advice.<p>

Next chapter: Taste of the Fantastic


	6. Taste of the Fantastic

**Chapter Six: Taste of the Fantastic**

"Well look at you."

Simmons can't keep the grin off his face. The creature standing in front of him is the weirdest thing he's ever seen, and that's saying a lot. At first glance, it looks like a miniaturized version of a NBE with one, striking deviation: it has a human face.

"What kind of hybrid freak are you?" he says.

The NBE frowns. Its hands twitch.

"Nuh uh," Simmons says. "You move and I blow a very large, very messy hole right between those eyes of yours. Now, stand up and walk to your right—_slowly_. There you go. Why don't you take a seat on the floor?"

Simmons maneuvers himself around so that he's half-sitting on the dresser with a view of both the door and the window, the NBE right in front of him.

It never hurts to be too paranoid.

By now the NBE has settled, legs folded awkwardly beneath it, Indian-style. It keeps staring at him as if it can't decide to be angry or afraid.

"So," Simmons says. "You wanna tell me who you were talking to?"

The NBE doesn't respond.

"Okay. We can go that route." Simmons shifts his gun to point at the thing's legs. "How about this? Every question you don't answer, I put a bullet in you, huh?"

"You won't," The NBE says. Its voice has a faint, mechanical buzz to it.

"You really wanna test that?"

"I'm not testing anything. You start shooting in here and people will hear it. They'll call the cops."

For a second, Simmons stares at the thing.

"Well, I've got a badge," Simmons says. "The cops come in here and all I've gotta do is flash it and explain that I caught someone breaking and entering. I'll be fine. But you?"

Simmons clicks his tongue.

"You screwed up, pal. So why not answer a few questions before my team gets here and we'll see if I can get them to go easier on you, eh? Maybe not cut you apart to see how you work. How about that?"

The muscles—he assumes that's what they are, anyway—bunch up as it clenches its jaw.

"Fine," it says.

_Bingo_, Simmons thinks. Out loud, he says, "Who were you talking to?"

"A friend."

"Uh huh," he says. He glances out the window and sees nothing but the blur of headlights on the highway beyond. "And should I be expecting this 'friend' of yours anytime soon?"

The NBE doesn't answer for a moment. Then, "No. He's not here."

Simmons can hear the silent "yet" at the end of that sentence. He doesn't have much time. He needs to get Perez and Cantrell down here with a containment and transport unit before something nasty shows up. He looks over to his cell phone, sitting on the dresser to his left.

_Shit_.

He can't take the gun off the NBE; the thing is watching every move he makes. It'd be all over him in half a second. But his left arm is in a goddamn sling.

"Alright, get up," he says. He hops off the dresser and edges back, toward the door as the NBE climbs to its feet. Even though it's a robot, it moves silently. It's eerie. "Walk over to the dresser and pick up the cell phone."

"What?" the NBE says.

"Pick up the cell phone," Simmons says. "Or we'll see how well that armor of yours works."

The thing actually rolls its eyes at him. For the first time, Simmons notices how young it looks.

_What's the reason for that_? he wonders. _Is it intentional? Some sort of disguise? Or is that the face of some kid they grabbed and dissected for parts?_

The NBE picks up the phone and looks to Simmons.

"Dial one," Simmons says.

The NBE pokes the screen. Simmons hears it click. For a moment, nothing happens. Then the NBE says, "It dropped the call."

"So do it again," Simmons says. "And if you think you can play some kind of game with me, pal, you are dead wrong."

"I'm not playing a game. Look. There's no network."

It holds the phone up. It's too far away for Simmons to make out.

"Nice try," Simmons says. "I'm not joking. I will shoot you if you don't—"

"I'm not trying anything. I'm telling you—"

"Please. I wasn't born yesterday, kid—"

"It's your stupid phone! I'm not—"

"—think you can buy some time pulling this—"

"—but it's not—wait. _What_?"

"—you've got another thing coming!" Simmons finishes. But the NBE isn't looking at him anymore. It's frowning, staring out into empty air.

"What do you mean?" it says. "Who's coming?"

_What_? Simmons thinks.

"Who the hell are you talking to?" he says. "If this is some kind of rescue, if you think for one second—"

"Oh shit," the NBE says. Its eyes widen. It looks back to him and says, "I'm gonna do something and please, don't freak out, but I need to see something, okay?"

It waits for Simmons to respond. The man's first instinct is to shoot it. Take it down and get his team in here before it manages to smear him all over the walls. But there's another part of him, a deeper part of his brain that does not like the expression on its face. The one that says something is very wrong. Robotic or not, that look is setting off alarm bells in Simmons's head.

His gun is still leveled at its forehead. He nods.

A transparent sheet of plastic slides down over the top half of that oh-so-human face, stopping at the nose. Then it lights up, bright blue, and the NBE turns, looking down and away. Simmons swears the thing's face pales.

"Oh shit," it says again.

"What?" Simmons says.

It doesn't look up. Its head moves, like it's tracking something Simmons can't see.

"We need to get out of here," it says.

"I don't think so," Simmons says, readjusting his grip on the gun.

"No, you need to listen to me. There are seven people coming up the stairs. They're armed. Sideswipe says that they pulled up in some kind of… of SWAT van or something—"

"'Sideswipe?' That your 'friend' from earlier? It's _outside_?"

"Yes. No! Argh! It doesn't matter. We—"

"Oh yes it does matter young man. You're not going anywhere."

"_They're in the hallway_. We have to go! Now!"

It moves toward him, reaching up with one hand. Simmons squeezes the trigger. The gun jerks up in his hand and the NBE flinches as the bullet misses its head and buries itself in the wall behind it.

Simmons ignores the ringing in his ears and flicks the muzzle of the weapon to the left. "On the bed."

For one moment, the NBE looks like it's going to do something stupid. It looks past Simmons again with that visor. Its hands clench into fists.

"We don't have time for this," it says.

"Oh I beg to differ," Simmons says. "On the bed. Now. Next time, I'm not going to miss."

"You _idiot_. They're _coming_!"

"Who? Who's coming?"

Which is when Simmons hears the pounding outside the door. Footsteps. A lot of them.

"_Machination_," the NBE says.

Simmons turns.

The door smashes in. He catches a glimpse of black body armor. He has two seconds to open his mouth to demand just what in the hell they think they're doing when the first one grabs his wrist, twists the gun from his fingers, and kicks out his knees. Simmons hits the ground.

* * *

><p>Hunter doesn't wait. The moment the agent turns away, he whirls around and dashes for the window. He hears a loud bang and splintering wood. Agent Simmons makes a weird noise in his throat. Hunter's grabs the chair next to the table and swings it into the window. The glass shatters.<p>

Something goes _thud_! The same something goes, "Oomph!"

He swings the chair again. The air conditioner shudders.

"Freeze!"

"Don't move!"

One more swing. It tumbles out. Hunter spins, the chair still in one hand, and throws it as hard as he can at the nearest gunman. He doesn't watch to see if it hits, just turns and vaults up, over the sill and the jagged edges of glass, and out into the night air.

_Ooooh GOD!_

For the third time in two days, Hunter feels the distinct rush of air as he plummets toward the ground. Time seems to stretch. He windmills his arms, feels himself turning in the air, senses the building rushing by behind him. He closes his eyes.

He hits hard; his left hip takes the brunt of it. The ground dents beneath him and something makes a hideous crunching noise and he's certain that he's broken himself. He lies there for a moment, waiting for the pain to hit.

Tires squeal. His eyes snap open just in time to see a red Lamborghini tear around the corner, back end fishtailing as it almost smears a silver sedan. It's Sideswipe. He skids to a stop. The passenger side door lifts up.

"Get in!" Sideswipe says.

Hunter lifts himself up out of shattered safety glass. He's landed on a car. He pulls himself out of what used to be someone's windshield and slides off the mangled hood.

_Sorry_, he thinks.

People are yelling inside the building. He chances a glance up at the window he came out of. He sees no one.

"Come on!"

Sideswipe is twitching. Hunter dives in. He's got one leg in when the door slams back down—almost taking his foot off. Sideswipe takes off. The teenager is thrown back; he loses his balance and lands on the gear stick.

"Watch it!" Sideswipe says.

"Sorry," Hunter says, trying to pull himself back into an upright position. Sideswipe helps by taking a hard left turn. Hunter is thrown against the window. "Ow! Hey!"

The 'bot just speeds up.

"Where are we going?" Hunter says.

"To get your body."

"Why? Can't we just—oomph! Can't we just nab that Simmons guy as they come out of the hotel?"

"Too public. And they've got gear that can damage me. Us. We wait until we get them alone and then we take them out."

"Wait, we?" Hunter says.

"I'm gonna need backup. Right now, that's you."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. I don't know how to do this stuff."

"You'd better learn fast, then," Sideswipe says. He darts into incoming traffic.

"Whagh!" Hunter says, throwing up his arms as headlights fill his vision. Then Sideswipe whips back into the other lane. A semi blares past.

"Listen," Sideswipe says. Hunter spots a red light up ahead but the alien isn't slowing down. "If you want to work together, you're gonna have to pull your own weight. I don't have time to walk you through this slag. You either keep up or you get out of the way, capiche?"

The red light streaks overhead. An SUV swerves; its grill misses them by inches. Hunter fumbles to connect his seatbelt.

"Don't bother," Sideswipe says. "We're almost there."

There's a field coming up on the left. Before they even reach the turnoff, the mech cuts across a lane of traffic and jolts up and over the curb. Hunter hits the ceiling.

"Ow! Damnit!"

Sideswipe doesn't bother with the driveway. He just cuts straight across the grass. Up ahead, a pond glimmers with reflected lights. Hunter's robotic body is a dark silhouette.

They slide to a stop. The door lifts up.

"Well?" Sideswipe says.

Hunter looks at the dashboard and then back to the body poised in front of a cluster of trees. Wind whispers in the leaves. Traffic rushes past. Sideswipe hums with impatience.

His entire life has descended into some awful, chaotic mess and he doesn't see any way out. Not without Sideswipe's help. Without him, Hunter is alone, with no allies, no backup, no plan.

Hunter looks up at the stars. There was a time, not so long ago, when he would have given his left arm for a taste of the fantastic. Now he's given everything and finds himself drowning in it.

In the glow of Sideswipe's headlights, the yellow, headless body moves.

"Alright then," Sideswipe says.

* * *

><p>As soon as they step outside and the night air washes over him, Simmons knows he's in trouble. His hands are cuffed together in front of him, his bad arm still in a sling. He can hear the shuffle of bodies around him, the crunching of boots on gravel and pavement, rustling, and a radio squawking. Cars in the distance. Something clicks and creaks and Simmons, who has pulled this very same operation many times before, finds himself being lifted up into the back of a vehicle and deposited on a metal bench.<p>

He can't see any of this, of course. Not with the black bag over his head.

The irony is staggering.

His assailants pile in around him. The—_what had the NBE said? SWAT van?_—door closes and a moment later, the engine rumbles to life.

_Well shit_.

He knows better than to talk. Asking questions or making a nuisance of himself will probably earn a punch to the gut or a gag or a taser. So he stays put, stays quiet, and tries to listen past the loudness of his own breathing.

These guys are professionals. He can tell that much right off the bat. They aren't talking either, didn't say a word as they pinned him to the carpet in his room and bound his hands and threw the bag over his head. Even now, in the relative safety of their own vehicle, they're silent.

It's a good sign, overall. If they don't talk, then he has nothing on them. No way to identify them, which means there's a chance that after they have what they want, they might let him go.

The vehicle turns right, out of the parking lot, the bench lurching underneath him as they pull out, onto the main road.

Christ, his shoulder throbs. His face is beginning to ache, too. His captors had had the decency not to rip his arm out of the sling and cuff him behind his back.

They're slowing. Seconds later and they turn left and start to pick up speed.

Shit. They're making for the highway.

Simmons tries to shift his left arm, take some of the weight off the strained muscles and ligaments.

They hit a pot hole and Simmons falls against the guy to his right. The guy shoves him back into place.

It's amazing how hard it is to maintain his balance without being able to see. The truck or van or whatever it is turns again. He has to brace his feet on the floor to keep himself on the bench. He'd memorized the roadmap around the hotel when he'd checked in, so he knows that to get on the highway, they've got to drive down a stretch or road that runs parallel to it for a while before they hit the on-ramp. Headed for the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport.

_**Shit.**_

They hit another bump. Simmons leaves the bench for a second. He slams back down and falls against the guy on his right again. The guy starts to say, "Fuck! Watch—" when the truck suddenly swerves and they're all thrown to the floor.

As Simmons tries to right himself—the van swerves, this time to the left and he bangs his head on the bench—someone else says, "We've got company!"

* * *

><p>Sideswipe gives the humans no warning. He spots them long before they're in visual range and he waits until there are no other human vehicles around before kicking in a burst of speed, covering the distance between them in nano-kliks.<p>

((Hunter, go,)) he comms.

The human veers out from behind him, cuts into the opposite lane. He darts past the SWAT vehicle and slides into their lane just in front of them.

((Okay,)) the human says. ((Ready.))

The larger vehicle accelerates. They must know what's going on. Any klik now and they're going to start shooting. He's not going to give them that chance.

((Do it,)) he says.

Hunter mutters some sort of religious incantation. Then he slows down. The SWAT van swerves, starts to go around.

Sideswipe moves in. Before they can so much as tap their brakes he pulls up alongside, driving parallel. He catches a glimpse of one of the humans inside, its squishy optics covered beneath a flimsy plastic covering.

He slams into them.

Their vehicle is much taller than Sideswipe. But it's hollow and made of weaker material than he is. It gives way. Tires screech and then they're both off the road.

((Hunter! Stop! Stop now!))

They're pushing back. The grass is slick. He hits a wet patch and loses traction for a nano-klik. Then one of the flesh-bags pops out of the side window with something on its shoulder.

_Is that_... he thinks.

It is. The squishy pulls the trigger. The back end of the tube lights up as a small projectile comes streaking out at him.

"Slag!" he says. He skids to the left. The projectile hits his hood, bounces off, and tumbles along his frame. It explodes right behind him. The blast lifts his back end up off the ground and he almost wipes out into the ditch.

_Fragging—half-bit—_

He fishtails wildly. Organic vegetation and mud sling out behind him before his tires find purchase.

((Ah!)) Hunter says.

Another explosion, this time out in front, and a flash of yellow as Hunter spins off the road. Then Sideswipe is past him, after the vehicle.

((You okay?)) he says.

((Shit!)) Hunter says.

The SWAT van has gotten back on the road. It speeds up.

_Sunny._

He's not going to lose his target. Agent Simmons might be his best chance of tracking down a lead before it's too late, before his brother…

They start shooting at him again with the smaller ammunition, the "bullets" that he'd pulled out of Hunter. They sting, yes, piss him off, yes, but they don't do any damage. He comes in low and fast, tucks himself as close to their rear fender as he can.

Hunter seems to have gotten back onto the road. Sideswipe can see him behind, gaining fast. Movement in their target. Another human leans out with the explosive weapon. It fires. This one clips Sideswipe before spinning off behind him.

((Watch out!)) he says.

Hunter is already swerving. It explodes harmlessly to the side.

((They're shooting rockets at us!)) Hunter says. ((Holy shit! They're shooting goddamn _rockets_ at us!))

_Don't you dare start glitching out on me now_, Sideswipe thinks.

The human makes a few sharp, jittery turns. He's slowing down. Sideswipe is running out of time.

He darts to the side, sees the humans reloading.

_All right, that's it. This ends now._

Panels along his back slide apart. His ion cannon jumbles out.

((What is _that_?)) Hunter says.

((This,)) Sideswipe says. He jerks to the right just in time to catch a human raising its weapon. The cannon hums. Warmth seeps in along his back. The human shoots. So does Sideswipe.

The ion blast catches the explosive in the air, vaporizes it, and continues past it. The human's arm disappears in a burst of carbonized atoms. Sideswipe pulls back behind them.

((_Jesus_,)) Hunter says.

((Get up alongside them, on the left,)) Sideswipe says.

((But—))

((Now!))

He does as he's told. Sideswipe moves with him, on the right, so that they're both flanking the target.

((I'm going to take off this back wheel,)) he says.

((What? But—))

((When I do that, you need to help me stabilize them. Keep them on the road and keep them upright. I'll give you a warning. You get in as close as possible, right up against them, alright?))

((Oh man.))

((Do you understand?)) The human doesn't answer. ((Hunter?))

((Yeah. I _got_ it.))

He stays where he is. Sideswipe waits another moment, makes sure he isn't going to bolt on him, and takes aim. He's right up against the van, tires skimming the edge of the pavement. The humans must know what he's about to do. Two more of them stick their arms out the window and shoot at him.

((Ow! Damnit!)) Hunter says. ((That stings!))

((Get ready,)) Sideswipe says.

The bullets bounce and ricochet off his windshield. The driver hits the brakes.

((Go!)) he says.

He shoots. The beam hits, obliterates the tire, the wheel, and four centra-metras of the wheel axle. The aft of the vehicle drops in a spray of sparks. Sideswipe is already pushed up against it, pushing it back, toward the center of the road. Hunter chatters, not even using real words, and Sideswipe wonders whether he knows he's broadcasting.

They're not stopping. Even with only three wheels left and the corner of the thing dragging the pavement, they're trying to speed up.

He whirls the cannon around and takes out the front wheel. The jolt shoves him away, off the road. His aft spins out. This time, he can't catch himself. He spins down the hill. When he can see straight, he finds the vehicle has stopped, stretched across both lanes of traffic.

_Finally_, he thinks. He transforms and picks himself out of the ditch.

* * *

><p>For a very long moment, it's all Simmons can do to lie there and not puke. If he does that, it'll just get caught in the hood over his face and there's a chance he could end up breathing it back in and choking on it and drowning in his own vomit. Not a good way to go. So he lies very still and wills the pain and the cramping in his stomach to stop.<p>

He's managed to twist his head around so he isn't lying on his abused nose anymore, but it still hurts so much that he's sure that if he could see, it would be in double. His shoulder is no better. Every breath sends a spike of agony down his arm and up his neck.

His abductors groan around him. Someone's knee digs into his ribs. He doesn't complain, though, doesn't push them off or try to wriggle away. He doesn't want to give away that he's awake, especially since he got his fingers up to the cord holding the bag over his head.

"Shit," someone says.

Another near him, to the left, groans. Somewhere, someone is whimpering and Simmons can tell that it's a bad whimpering, a something-fucked-up-has-happened-to-this-man kind of whimpering.

"_Shit_," the same guy from before says again.

The one lying next to him shifts. His knee digs in hard for a moment and then withdraws.

"He out?"

Simmons stills. A boot nudges his leg. Seconds later, fingers press into his neck.

"Still alive," a new voice says.

"Get him up. We're bailing. I want two lines around him, shoot anything that gets near. Headquarters already know we're down. All we gotta worry about is keeping him secure until backup arrives."

_Damnit!_ Simmons thinks.

Hands latch underneath each arm. Sudden gunfire breaks out near the front—where he thinks the front is. It's muffled. The men holding him freeze.

"Go! Go!"

"Weapons!"

_What the fuck is going on?_

"Jesus!" the guy up front screeches.

Something hits the van hard. Simmons, still lying on the floor, feels the impact in his bones. The whole back of the SWAT van jumps up off the ground. The two men standing over him fall away. Simmons scrabbles at the cords, trying to rip them away.

Men move around him; one steps on his elbow. _Something_ has their attention and Simmons has a very bad feeling that he knows what it is.

Another jolt. The vehicle rocks on its remaining tires. Metal shrieks. The van shakes. And then he hears nothing but noise as his abductors open fire. He curls up and covers the ear that isn't pressed to the floor. Two seconds later and a draft of wind ruffles his clothes. The foot next to his elbow disappears.

_Oh holy hell_, he thinks.

Metal beams wrap around him. The floor drops away. His dinner almost comes back up. The thing holding him—_fingers, goddamn giant, metal fingers, oh holy Christ_—cups around him. He feels trembling, shockwaves, and hears the _snap-hiss_ of bullets just missing him.

An NBE is lifting him out of the van. He's being abducted by aliens. Despite himself, despite the awful racket and the pain, he can't stop himself from laughing. The world tilts once, twice, three times. The next thing he knows, his feet touch the ground and those giant fingers give him a push and he tumbles through the air.

His right shoulder bangs into something hard, the rest of him lands on something soft, something squishy, something contoured an awful lot like a car seat.

"Get him out of here," a mechanized voice says.

"Where?" another says. This one is near, right by his head, and it's familiar. The hotel room. The one with a human face. Christ, he even _sounds_ young.

"Just… take him back to that park of yours."

"Where are you—"

"Go."

The first NBE doesn't shout. It doesn't raise its voice at all. But Simmons can hear the promise of violence in it. Apparently, the kid NBE can, too; a shudder runs through it.

"Okay," it says.

Simmons hears a hiss and a click.

_The door?_

He starts digging at the cords again. The car accelerates. The knot is in the back of the hood and he has to lift both of his arms to get at it, but the pain is worth it when, ten seconds of fumbling later, he pulls the thing off his head. He takes a deep breath of cool, dry air, slightly tinted by an odd, burning-ozone smell. He looks at the dashboard.

"Hello _again_," he says.

* * *

><p>Two chapters this week because it's my birthday and I can. Thank you Starfire201 and lildevchick for your continued reviews. And thank you KayDeeBlu for your wonderful input.<p>

Next chapter: Target


	7. Target

**Chapter Seven: Target**

Agent Simmons sits on a rusty swing. His skin is pale and kind of ashen. Cars pass by every now and then, close enough for Hunter to look in and see the drivers, but no one stops to ask why a grown man is hanging out on a swing-set in the middle of a park, alone, at night.

Neither of them has said anything since they left Sideswipe. Hunter, because he doesn't know what to say, and Simmons, because he looks like he's feeling too crappy to care. He keeps reaching up to rub his left shoulder. His chin is tucked to his chest, hiding most of his face in shadows, but his expression is drawn. His breathing is shallow.

Hunter wants to ask if he's all right. But a glance is enough to answer that and there's nothing he can do anyway, so he sits there, silently, watching the sensor grid for a flicker of Sideswipe.

It's been twenty minutes. He hasn't heard so much as a word from the red mech.

Simmons sniffs and raises his head. He rests it on the swing's chain. He blinks a few times. His face is even worse than at the hotel, all puffy, the bruises a sick purple spreading under his eyes.

"So you wanna tell me what we're doing here?" the agent says.

Hunter tries not to fidget.

"Waiting," he says.

"Yeah, I see that. I meant the rest of it. More specifically, I meant 'we' as in 'me.'"

"I think we should wait for Sideswipe."

The corner of Simmons's mouth twists up into a pained smile. "Huh. Well it was worth a shot."

He falls silent. He just sits there, staring off into the distance. He almost looks amused.

"Who _are_ you?" Hunter says.

Simmons quirks an eyebrow at him. He huffs a short bark of laughter. "Seriously? You people go through all this and—"

"Not that," Hunter says. "I mean, I know who you are. I meant…"

Simmons raises his eyebrows.

"You're taking all of this pretty well," Hunter says.

Simmons shrugs his right shoulder. And then winces. "I've seen a lot of strange things. Though _you_, you might just take the cake."

Hunter rocks back on his tires. "Can you please just drop that, already?"

"Whatever," Simmons says. He's still got that half-smile, half-sneer on his face.

_Jerk_, Hunter thinks.

"What's with the human face, anyway?" Simmons says.

Hunter sighs in his head.

"They call it a 'Headmaster,'" he says. Though Simmons slumped posture doesn't change, his eyes fix on Hunter. "I don't know a lot about it. I was kidnapped a month ago by these people, 'Machination.' They did this to me. I woke up and I was… I was like this."

Simmons makes a noise in his throat. He shifts a little and winces. He rubs his shoulder again.

"Are… is there something I can do to help with that?" Hunter says.

The agent's grin becomes more of a grimace. "Not unless you got a couple of Oxycodone in your glove compartment."

"No. Sorry."

The man gives a half-hearted eyebrow shrug and breathes out through his nose.

_He's way too calm_.

Simmons hasn't complained. He didn't freak out or yell or do anything that Hunter would have done were he in the agent's shoes. When they'd stopped at the park, they'd sat in the dark for a few minutes and then Agent Simmons had asked if he could get out, get "some fresh air." It wasn't like the guy could get far if he _had_ tried to run off. And it was weird having someone sit in him. So Hunter had opened the door and turned on his headlights so Simmons could see where he was going.

Hunter doesn't think it's the pain. There's something about him, something he can't quite put his finger on. The agent keeps looking at him with a strange glint in his eyes, with a kind of hard expression.

_He's not scared_.

"How much longer are we gonna stay here?" Simmons says.

Hunter checks the grid again. Still no sign of Sideswipe. He opens up the mech's comm line.

((Sideswipe?))

He waits. Cars whoosh by. Somewhere in the distance, a police siren whoops twice. Simmons scratches his nose and rocks back. The swing chains rattle.

((Sideswipe?))

((What?)) Sideswipe says.

((Where are you?))

There's another long silence. Hunter can just pick up some of the background noise—traffic and something else. Then, ((I'm busy. What is it?))

((How much longer are you gonna be?))

Sideswipe makes a noise very close to a sigh. ((I'm not sure. Why?))

((Simmons doesn't look so good. I think we need to take him to a hospital or something.))

((You stay right where you are,)) he snaps. Then, ((We need him, Hunter. Someone wants him, I'm guessing Machination, which means he's got something. I scanned him before I handed him over. He should be fine. Just… just stay there, okay? I won't be long.))

((Yeah. Okay,)) Hunter says.

The line goes dead. Hunter looks to Simmons, still staring at him, and tries not to sink on his tires. It was very faint and he'd barely caught it, but he's pretty sure the background noise he heard over Sideswipe's comm line had been people screaming.

* * *

><p>Wind gusts through the trees. The road is dark and silent. Three cars have driven past and none of them have stopped. Sideswipe watches from his spot amongst the vegetation some hundred and fifty metras away. He's crouched down, one knee sinking into the soft ground. He hasn't moved in thirty kliks.<p>

The humans are still screaming. They get louder whenever the wind kicks up and the vehicle starts to sway. He can't find it in himself to care.

_Hunter, you'd better not be doing anything stupid_, he thinks.

Headlights on the road. The distant sound of an engine drawing closer. Sideswipe powers down as much as he can without locking himself into recharge.

Two vehicles—large, dark, and identical—come up the road. He waits. They start to slow even before they get to the clearing he's so carefully staged. They pull over and stop. They idle there for another klik, lights off, everything silent, making no move to do anything though they must be able to see what's just off the road. He starts to wonder about that when a tingling wave washes over him.

Sideswipe scowls.

A sensor sweep. Some meat-bag in one of those SUV's has Cybertronian technology.

The doors on the lead vehicle open. Several humans pile out and move to surround their convoy. They jog in a low crouch—more of a scurry—covered in dark armor, all of them carrying weapons Sideswipe _knows_ are not from this planet.

_Slag_.

They pause. He can just make out the dim sounds of low voices, too far to understand. Then a smaller group breaks off and starts to head down the slope, toward the woods. They move slowly, ignoring the shouts from their comrades above. Either they can't hear them through the helmets they wear, or they don't care. Or, more realistically, they're too worried about what might be waiting for them just out of sight.

Sideswipe turns his attention from them and over to the vehicles. They've got license plates in the front. Thirty nano-kliks of hacking later reveals a dead-end. They're fakes.

He tenses.

The forward team reaches the tree. Sideswipe had picked the tallest one he could find. The grill of the SWAT van is still half a human height above their heads. One of them calls something up to the men trapped inside. They shout something back. Another of the ground team turns and makes some kind of hand signal toward the road. The lights on the second SUV turn on and it pulls out into the road.

Sideswipe finds himself facing a dilemma. Stay put and see where the armed humans go, or follow the second vehicle, the one no one came out of? It takes him three nano-kliks to decide; he doesn't need more drones to question. He needs to find their boss. And the fleeing SUV? This could be his ticket.

_Hang on Sunny_, he thinks. _I'm on my way._

* * *

><p>Jerri Stephens has just sat down and popped open a can of Pepsi, when her cell phone rings. She pulls it out, takes one look at the screen, and considers throwing it against the wall.<p>

She sighs and flips it open.

"Yes?" she says.

"Ms. Stephens? It's Dr. Berkman."

Jerri rolls her eyes. "I know. What do you want?"

"I see you made it back all right. Everything went well, I take it? Good. Listen, we have another job for you."

The man barely pauses long enough to inhale. Jerri glares at the far wall.

"What do you mean?" she says. She'd taken care of the crony as ordered. And then she'd hauled his sorry carcass all the way back so the rest of the geek squad could start stripping their equipment out of it.

"It seems Mr. Thurston—"

Ah. That had been the crony's name.

"—well, it appears he might have failed," Berkman says. "I'm looking at the reports and it seemed the man he, ah, terminated was in the passenger seat. But he wasn't the target. They apparently switched seats before leaving the site. The passenger was just a field agent, someone named Salazar."

_Somehow, I'm not surprised_, Jerri thinks.

"Anyway, I dispatched a team to pick up Agent Simmons but… we lost them."

"'Lost them'?" Jerri says. The muscles in her neck pull tight. A dull ache begins to form at the base of her skull. "What do you mean, 'lost them'?"

"They were attacked."

At first, Jerri isn't sure how to respond. "Attacked." Not "detained." Not "taken into custody." But _attacked_. It's a very specific word with very specific connotations, none of which she likes.

_Oh hell_.

"That's not the main problem, however," the egghead says after a sufficiently dramatic pause. "We've recovered the team. There were a few casualties, some of them, ah, _extensive._ Unfortunately, the target was taken. Now, I know you just got back and you must be tired, but we'd really appreciate it if—"

"Look," Jerri cuts in. "I signed up for three gigs, the third of which I have delivered to your lab. As soon as I make sure my accounts are in order, I intend to leave."

"Yes, I'm aware of the, but—"

"No, Dr. Berkman."

"Please, I really—"

"_No_. I'm going now."

"Ms. Stephens, be reasonable. We can… what? I—yes. Of course."

Jerri pauses halfway through flipping the phone shut. There's rustling and then a new voice comes on. She recognizes the drawl immediately.

"Ms. Stephens?"

She brings the phone back up to her ear and sinks into the chair. She can picture the man on the other line: heavy-set, face creased with smile lines. She'd met him once: he'd shaken her hand and welcomed her "on board." His palms had been wide and dry. He'd been wearing some ridiculous, over-sized cowboy hat.

"Hello, Mr. Dante," she says.

"We've got a proposition for you, if you're willing to hear us out, of course."

Jerri takes a deep breath, counts to three, and says, "I'm listening."

* * *

><p>It's getting light out. The night sky fades to the east, out over the pond and the trees. Simmons tries not to shiver. It's not cold out—it's Texas, for crying out loud—but he's been sitting on that swing, motionless, for hours.<p>

His shoulder aches. Every time he moves, every jostle sends a new stab of throbbing pain down his arm. His face feels worse. Whatever healing his body might have started has been obliterated. Simmons blames that damned metal bench on the SWAT van. Or maybe it had been some asshole's knee. His memory is hazy, with the swerving and the shooting and the giant, alien robots.

He's tired. His adrenaline ran out hours ago. The only thing keeping him upright at this point is the pain and sheer stubbornness.

_Why are we still sitting here?_

This is plain and simple bad protocol. At first, he'd thought it'd been the precursor to interrogation. Let the victim stew in his own misery for a while, soften him up. But his abductor, that _kid_—because that's what he was. It wasn't just the face, oh no. Every single little thing he did smacked of a kind of adolescent awkwardness. The kid hadn't said a word. Hadn't started questioning him, hadn't tried to bully or buy him. Nothing. Just sat there, headlights illuminating the playground.

_Maybe it's an alien thing_, he wonders.

He shifts and tries not to grimace. The seat isn't made for adults. His ass has gone numb. He's starting to get that light-headed feeling of spending too much time getting shot at, and not enough time sleeping. He reaches up and runs a hand over his face. His vision blurs for a second.

_Damn,_ he thinks. _I __**am**__ getting old._

"So," the kid says.

Simmons looks to the yellow car. _Here it comes._

The kid hesitates—Simmons thinks the pause is a hesitation—and says, "You've gotta be getting hungry."

Simmons blinks.

Another pause. He wouldn't be surprised to see the thing fidget. The driver's side door lifts up.

"Come on," the kid says.

Simmons knows how to get information out of people. He knows what questions to ask and when. He also knows when to keep his mouth shut and go with it.

He stands, winces as half a dozen vertebrae pop back into place, and starts toward the car.

* * *

><p>The sun has barely come up and already, the streets are clogged with traffic. Sideswipe sits four cars behind his target. The street-lights ahead are green and yet no one moves.<p>

_I hate this planet_, he thinks.

((Hunter,)) he comms.

No response.

For the last twenty kliks he's been trying to reach the human, and for the last twenty kliks he hasn't gotten anything. Either the squishy is ignoring him, or his comm is off. Neither of those scenarios bode well.

_Slaggit, human, where are you?_

He'd better not have done something stupid. Sideswipe can't afford to chase him down again. Sunny can't afford to wait that long.

The SUV flashes its turn signal. It's pulling into the lot for some sort of industrial business center—three stories tall with trimmed vegetation out front.

Sideswipe watches them go around the side of the building and disappear into the back. He keeps driving. Three blocks later, he turns around. When he gets back it's to find the vehicle still there, the engines off and ticking, the inside empty. He pulls into the driveway for the neighboring building and parks.

_Oh, this keeps on getting better_.

A scan shows nothing. As in _absolutely_ nothing. According to his sensors, there shouldn't be anything there but an empty slab of slag. And yet, he's staring at three stories of shoddy human construction.

A sensor block. More Cybertronian technology. He picks up a communication network, but it, too, is shielded. He can't hack it from the outside.

Sideswipe tries the comm again, curses when Hunter fails to respond, and settles in to wait.

* * *

><p><em>I really hope this doesn't come back to bite me in the ass<em>, Hunter thinks.

The Walgreen's parking lot is half empty. That still leaves a few people milling around outside, all of them dressed normally, presentable, and most of them stare at Simmons passing by on the way to the doors. He doesn't seem to mind, doesn't even seem to notice their glances.

It's weird, how calm he is. About everything. The man is unshakable. Hunter had broken into his room, Machination henchmen had dragged him away, and then Sideswipe had smashed in the front of their truck and peeled off the top like a can of soup and scooped the man out. And he just saunters along like nothing's going on.

_Speaking of Sideswipe…_

Hunters comm is off. He considers turning it back on and letting the 'bot know where they are.

"He needed some painkillers," Hunter would say. "It was a quick stop. I couldn't make him sit there all day."

He doesn't, though. He doesn't know how the mech will react. Probably not well. With any luck, he can get Simmons something to eat and get back to the park before Sideswipe notices anything is wrong.

Hunter scans the store again and sighs in his head. Eighteen people are inside and he can't tell one from the other. He settles down on his tires. An old lady passing by on the sidewalk stops and blinks.

_Oops_.

She shakes her head and starts walking again and Hunter resigns himself to holding still and waiting.

_Please don't come back to bite me in the ass._

* * *

><p>People are staring. He must look like hell. A quick glance into one of those isle mirrors confirms it. Simmons prods his mottled face with the fingers of his good hand.<p>

_Jesus Christ_, he thinks.

He looks like he just stumbled out of a bar fight. His face is the worst; he hasn't been able to breathe through his nose since last night. His eyelids are puffy and he's walking around with a perpetual squint. The stitches seem to be holding, which is the only good thing. His clothes are rumpled, one sleeve is torn, and his tie is a total loss.

He smoothes himself down as best he can and tucks the ends of his shirt in. The sleeves he rolls up, which hides most of the tear. The tie gets stuffed into his pocket.

There. Presentable. Which he's going to need it if he wants anyone to take him seriously. First thing's first, however.

He grabs the first Ibuprofen bottle he sees and tears open the box. He pops the seal, fishes out three pills, and tosses them back, dry.

"Gleh," he says and tries not to gag.

There's a cooler on the way to the register. He grabs a bottle of water and gulps down half of it as he heads to the front of the store. He notices at least two employees relax as he takes his place in line.

The abduction squad—the kid had called them "Machination"—had left his wallet in his pants pocket. Either a stupid oversight, or it hadn't mattered to them. So when the cashier starts to ring him up a few minutes later—pausing to eyeball the shredded box—he reaches in and pulls out his badge and smiles calmly at her.

"Hi," he says. "I was wondering if I could use your phone?"

* * *

><p>Starfire201 and lildevchick, you guys are awesome. Like, with a capital "A". And so is KayDeeBlu for telling me when parts are confusing (or boring). So I can clarify (or remove) them.<p>

Next chapter: What Did You Do


	8. What Did You Do

**Chapter Eight: What Did You Do**

_This sucks slag_.

Sideswipe hates using his holo-emitter. It's not the power drain. It's the way it makes his paneling tingle when it touches him, it's not the way it makes his joints itch. It's that he's not very good at it. He can create one. He can put all the right features in all the right places. What he doesn't do well is the details: getting it to move right. He forgets little things like blinking or those minute facial expressions that humans make all the time. That's one of the things Sunny is better at.

The parking lot outside his target building is empty. The employee cars are parked to the sides, all out of the way. Sideswipe pulls up, trying to ignore the tickling inside where the holo-form sits. The front and center of the building is made up entirely of windows. He can see inside the lobby; shiny, polished tile stretches all the way back to a far wall dotted with hanging pictures. Two stairways lead up to a second floor balcony and the first row of office doors.

Sideswipe mimics the sound of an engine turning off, waits a moment, and lifts his door. Tingles sweep over the side of his frame as the holo-form steps out. It's a human male with dark hair and light eyes. It's dressed in what Google had called, "business casual," whatever that means. He walks it over to one of the optical sensors hidden along his side and has it face him. He practices the expressions a few times.

_How the slag does a smile have a temperature, anyway?_ he thinks.

Satisfied, he walks it up to the doors. Sideswipe has to concentrate to get its fingers to grab the handle. Then it's through.

Up front is a desk with a female sitting behind it. She looks up as the holo-form enters.

"Oh," she says. Her eyes widen. She opens her mouth again but no sound comes out. She blinks three times. "Oh, um, hi."

Here comes the tricky part. The holo-form is just an image. It has no vocalizer, no way to speak. Sideswipe, as it turns out, made the right decision by commandeering Jetfire's ship. Jetfire, being a scientist and having an occasional need to interact with alien life forms, had specialized equipment designed for this very problem.

From a miniaturized vocalizer held inside the holo-form, Sideswipe says, "Hello."

The woman's mouth flaps again and she says, "I'm sorry. It's just… does anyone ever tell you you look just like Patrick Dempsey?"

Considering it was photos of that human that Sideswipe had built this image from…

"All the time," he says, smiling in a way he hopes is "warm."

The woman grins and drops her gaze. The skin of her face changes colors, reddening along her cheeks and neck.

"I'm sorry," she says again.

"It's okay."

"Um, what can I do for you?"

Sideswipe leans the holo-form against the counter. "I'm here to see your boss."

"Mr. Clarke?"

"Yep," Sideswipe says, adding a silent, _I hope_.

"Hold on, I'll let him know you're here. What's your name?"

"Michael Bell."

The woman nods. She picks up the phone on her desk, glances at him, and punches in numbers. Sideswipe rips his attention from the holo-form to the front of the building. He scans the windows. Most are dark or empty. A few rooms, however, are occupied, and it's these he searches, looking for—

There. An older male picks up a phone and says something.

"Sir?" the woman downstairs says. She smiles again at the holo-form. "I have a Mr. Bell here to see you?"

The man's eyebrows scrunch together. His office is on the second floor, overlooking the parking lot.

_Got you_.

The holo-form winks out. The vocalizer clatters to the tile. The woman jumps. The 'form materializes right next to Mr Clarke. The man looks at it and freezes, mouth hanging open, skin turning a funny gray color. The holo-form waves. Right before it reaches across the desk and snatches the laptop sitting in front of the man.

"Wha—hey!" Mr. Clarke says.

Too late. The holo-form bolts across the room and hits the window. Glass shatters. Holo-form and laptop tumble through the air two stories and hit the ground. The 'form bursts in a spray of light; the laptop bounces once and skitters away.

_Oops_.

Sideswipe reactivates the 'form. It shimmers into existence right next to him. The woman in the lobby is standing, staring at him, her eyes wide, her skin pale. The holo-form smiles at her and she takes a few, shaky steps back and hits her chair. She flops down, hard.

The laptop is under a bush. Sideswipe retrieves it and tosses the thing inside as the first guards show up. He dismisses the image, pulls his door shut, and backs out of the parking space.

He floors it. Someone opens fire. An electrified canister clips his back. A nasty shock races through his frame. But it's not enough to stop him and he hits the street, finds a gap in traffic, and peals out, onto the road.

((Hunter?)) he comms.

Still no answer.

Sideswipe grumbles to himself. By the time he gets on the highway headed north, he's doing three times the posted speed limit.

* * *

><p>Simmons has the courtesy to eat his breakfast outside the McDonald's. He's as close to Hunter as he can get, seated at an outside kiddie-booth. He squints in the early morning sunlight and takes a bite out of his breakfast biscuit. Two empty wrappers are crumpled in a pile next to his elbow, but he's still eating with gusto, stopping every now and then to take a swig of coffee. Hunter notices that he grimaces and kind of shakes his head every time he sets the cup down. It's nice to see him feeling better, even if part of Hunter's brain keeps telling him that a plucky captive is more likely to bolt than a tired, hungry, pain-hazed one.<p>

He gives himself a mental slap.

"Ugh. Burned it," Simmons says. He tilts the cup up and shakes the last few drops into his mouth.

Hunter can't actually remember the last thing he ate.

Simmons wolfs down the rest of his food and adds the wrapper to the pile. He wipes his mouth and sighs. Hunter watches him watching cars. It's 7:28 a.m. Traffic is thinking about clearing up.

Simmons stands. He tosses the collected wad into the trash. The agent eyeballs the empty cup. Despite the grumbling, he still looks disappointed when he tosses it in, too. He shuffles over to the parking lot, hitches his pants up, and takes a seat on the curb next to Hunter's bumper.

"So, what now, kid?" he says.

Hunter lifts the driver's side door.

"I'm fine," Simmons says. He stretches his legs out.

Hunter wishes he could glare.

"Your friend gonna meet us here?"

This time, it's not the chance of someone overhearing him that keeps Hunter's mouth shut. For some reason, Simmons smirks.

"Though it'd probably help if he knew where we were, huh?"

Hunter's door twitches. The agent's smirk turns into a grin.

_Ah shit_, Hunter thinks.

Simmons cocks his head. "Running off with the prize? I guess you guys don't do the whole loyalty thing."

"I'm not—" Hunter says, pauses. Simmons lifts his eyebrows. "I'm not running off."

"Uh huh. And that's why we've spent the last two hours poking around in Dallas? Even though he told you to go to the park?"

The real question glitters in the man's eyes.

"It's not like that," Hunter says. "I thought you should get something to eat, is all."

"Mmm. So we'll be heading back, now?"

Despite himself, despite the way the man is staring at him with that knowing look, he hesitates. He _should_ take him back. He should hand him over to Sideswipe. That would be the easiest thing to do; Sideswipe seems to know what he's doing. Hunter is just guessing.

"_Don't say that name!"_

He'd heard it in that transmission. Behind Sideswipe's voice, he'd heard people screaming. Hunter had left him all alone with that van and the people inside it, knowing what he was capable of. He remembers the look on Sideswipe's face as he'd loomed over Hunter and smashed his arm.

_He's only here to get Sunstreaker, _Hunter thinks. _He doesn't care about anyone else. What will he do if Simmons doesn't cooperate? Or if he doesn't know anything? What will he do?_

He _can't_ take Simmons back. Even though he's rude and blunt—and right—Hunter can't just fork him over to Sideswipe.

"You seem to be having some trouble with that," Simmons says. "So let me rephrase myself: What are _your _plans, kid?"

Hunter doesn't have an engine to start. He's not really a car. The space where an engine would go is filled with the robotic shell and whatever bits of Hunter there are left. Still, the sound of an engine rumbling to life makes for a great cue.

Simmons stares at him for one, long moment. Hunter waits, hoping that he doesn't get up and start walking away because he really doesn't want to chase him down and he _really_ doesn't want to get shot again.

But Simmons doesn't run. He stands and brushes himself off. He slides in. Hunter shuts the door and waits until the agent buckles himself in before he backs out.

The park is to the south. Hunter turns north. Simmons doesn't say anything, and Hunter can't see his face, but he doesn't have to know the man is grinning.

* * *

><p>Ten minutes later Hunter pulls over into a shopping center and parks in front of a Radio Shack. He kills the sound of the engine and sits still and tries to gather his thoughts. He can feel a minute shift in Simmons's weight—he thinks he's turning his head.<p>

"What, you need to pick up a cell phone?" Simmons says.

"No," Hunter says. He pauses. Then, "Listen, I'm… we're not going back. Sideswipe isn't the most, ah, _stable_ of people."

"Oh. So you're trying to save me, then?"

He can _hear_ the sneer in there. Hunter grinds his teeth.

"Call it whatever you want to," he says. "But I need to talk to you."

"About what?" Simmons says it calmly, but Hunter can still detect the tension in his body.

"Those guys who tried to kidnap you? I think they were Machination."

"You 'think?'"

"I've been trying to track them down for a week, ever since… anyway. Sideswipe and I saw footage of you and some other FBI at a car accident up in Chicago a few days ago."

"You're involved in that?" Simmons voice takes a slight edge to it.

"Sideswipe was. That was another Headmaster, one who worked for Machination. Sideswipe's been tracking them, too. Then, the next day, you were in Dallas at that… that building."

He can't say it. It's just two words. "Crash site." And he can't get them out of his mouth.

"That Sideswipe's handiwork, too?" Simmons says. A few seconds go by. Hunter scrambles for something to say. Simmons beats him to it with," That was _you_? Wow, kid. What'd you do? Launch a missile at it?"

He's laughing. He's actually _laughing_.

"You think it's funny?" Hunter says.

"Yeah," Simmons says. The answer is so blunt that it cuts right through Hunter's growing outrage. "You go on about this other NBE being so dangerous, but it's not him who wrecks a skyscraper and kills ten people. At least he had the decency to avoid civilians. But you? You, the morality pet? It's you who did more damage."

"I didn't mean to—"

"Doesn't matter. Ignorance can do more harm that outright malice, kid. Looks like you get to learn that one the hard way."

_I didn't mean to hurt anyone. I never did it intentionally._

He only went in for information. Then those guys had attacked him. All he'd wanted to do was get out. That was it. He hadn't gone in looking for a fight. He hadn't gone in asking to get shot. _He_ hadn't shot at anyone. And yet ten—_ten?_—people died. Ten people who would never go home, who would never get to see their families again.

_**I **__didn't torture anyone_.

Sideswipe had. Sideswipe had hunted down the Headmasters in order to interrogate and kill them. So who the hell was this smug bastard to sit there and pass judgment on him? He knew nothing. He hadn't been there, he hadn't seen the focused fury in the mech's eyes. He hadn't had his arm crushed. _He hadn't had his mind invaded._

_Sideswipe fixed it._

Hunter's whirling thoughts slow. The 'bot had fixed his arm. He'd apologized and through Hunter's uneasy haze of pain and fear and sheer fatigue, it had sounded genuine.

_All I've done is run away._

"Let me get this straight," Simmons says. "You're both going after this 'Machination,' correct? So you see a clip of my team on the news and you bust into my hotel room to kidnap me? Was that one your idea, too?"

"We didn't kidnap you."

"Which is why I'm sitting in a shopping center instead of, I don't know, doing my job."

"Machination kidnapped you first."

"Because that makes all the difference."

"Listen, you pompous ass, if it hadn't been for me, they'd have taken you and brainwashed you or killed you. But they didn't. And now you're sitting in a shopping center, in the air conditioning, with food in your stomach and some Tylenol in your pocket."

"Ibuprofen," Simmons says.

"_I don't care_. It could be worse for you, you know."

"Is that a threat?"

Simmons isn't sitting inside a car, he's sitting inside Hunter's robotic body. Hunter lurches the driver's seat forward. Simmons bangs into the steering wheel.

"Ah! _Shit_. Real mature, kid," Simmons says. He sniffs through his nose.

"What were you looking for?" Hunter says." What was your team investigating?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?"

Hunter twitches the seat again.

"You know, you can really pull off a one-man 'good cop, bad cop' routine. You should think about a career in law enforcement. Oh, wait."

"Damn it, Simmons. They tried to take you for a reason. What were you investigating? What do you know? Why were you in Dallas?"

"I'm FBI. It's my _job_."

"Bullshit. You were following our trail. Why? It's not a coincidence that you were at Chicago _and_ Epsilon Holdings. You people know something. And—"

He was following their trail. He wasn't afraid of Hunter. In the hotel room, for the few seconds that Hunter had really looked at him and not the gun pointed at his face, he'd seen not fear, not surprise. He'd looked… delighted.

"You're looking for the Autobots," Hunter says.

"The what?" Simmons says.

It all makes sense. Simmons had been glancing to the window in the hotel. Not the door, the _window_, as if he knew Sideswipe wasn't human-sized. The way he'd watched Hunter on that swing set, not with nervousness, but with curiosity. He'd been studying him.

"Hey, kid, you still with me?"

"You're not FBI, are you?" Hunter says.

"Excuse me?"

Hunter's sensors go dark. Suddenly, he can see things, but a part of him no longer recognizes them. No energy signatures, no nothing. According to his feedback, the shops, the people in them, they shouldn't be there. He's felt this once before, in Epsilon Holdings, right before armed gunmen stormed inside and everything went to shit.

_Machination! But how—_

Simmons thumps him on the steering wheel and says, "You alright? You didn't go and fry yourself, did you?"

_**Simmons**__. Oh god. Is he one of them? But why stage your own kidnapping unless… unless he's a Trojan horse. He's bait. Oh god._

The Walgreens. He'd been in there for a long time. Hunter had thought he was just being an ass. But if that wasn't it, if he was one of Machination, then he must have gotten a hold of them there. He must have contacted them.

"What did you _do_?" Hunter says.

"What?"

Hunter doesn't bother with sound effects. He throws himself out of the parking stall and almost takes out the front of a white van. It honks, Simmons shouts, and Hunter is already moving, his tires squealing as he peels out of there.

"What the hell!" Simmons says.

"Shut up and sit down," Hunter says. He tightens the seatbelt so the man can't move.

His eyes. He has to use his eyes. There: two silver sedans coming up the aisle at him, fast. A dark green SUV pulls out in front of him. Hunter wrenches himself to the side. He hits a median, his underside scrapes along concrete as he plows through a bush and thumps back onto the pavement.

"What the hell's going on?" Simmons says.

"You should know!"

"What does _that_ mean?"

"Your friends are after us!" Hunter snarls.

"_What?_"

Shit. He's headed straight for a concrete wall. He twists left.

"Look out!"

A flash of pale blue and a woman screams. Hunter hits the brakes. His frame shudders as he skids to a stop two inches short of running her over. She falls back, her eyes huge.

The sedans are still coming. Hunter can see the barrels of some kind of weapon sticking out the windows.

"Sorry!" he says and takes off again. The shops flash past in a blur. He's going too fast. Part of him knows this. The other part of him is too busy noting that his pursuit is gaining to care.

He needs to turn left. There's a driveway to the street, an exit. But then a _third_ sedan comes flying out of nowhere, racing parallel to him. It's going to get there before he does.

"Kid!" Simmons says.

They're rolling down their windows. They're leveling some kind of bazooka at him.

_No!_

His back half peels apart. It's the weirdest thing Hunter has ever felt. Panels slide away and something inside whirs and lifts out.

"What is _that_?" Simmons says.

A red crosshair blinks on the screen over Hunter's eyes.

_Oh_, he thinks. He's got Sunstreaker's body. Sunstreaker had missile launchers.

No time to think about it. The crosshairs follow his vision as he looks to the front of the car. He takes aim a few feet in front of them.

There's no trigger for him to squeeze. No button to push. This body doesn't work that way. Instead, Hunter focuses and thinks, _fire_.

A low rumbling builds through him. Something hisses. Then a blast of hot air washes over his roof. He catches a glimpse of something small and dark and fast streak through the air.

"Whoa!" Simmons says.

His optics cut out. He hears the huge, concussive _bang!_ He actually feels the wave blast through him. Simmons clutches the seat; Hunter thinks the man shouts something. The next moment, the screen over his eyes is back on and he's bursting through a smoke cloud. The sedan spins away. Part of the front is gone. He sees people on the ground, people scurrying, more just standing and staring.

"Jesus," Simmons says.

They're at the driveway. The cars on the street beyond have stopped. He darts out, cuts a hard right onto the sidewalk, and floors it. Two seconds later and the other two cars screech out after him.

_Oh shit!_ he thinks. _Now what?_

* * *

><p>Neither of the humans are there. Sideswipe can tell that much before he even pulls into the park. He keeps going, hoping he's wrong, hoping his sensors lie, hoping they maybe left something behind, some kind of explanation for why Hunter and Simmons are not where they should be.<p>

The park is full of humans now. Miniature ones run screaming, climbing things and digging in the dirt. The older ones watch over and talk amongst themselves. A few look over when he comes to a stop at the edge of the grass.

_Slaggit, Hunter! You idiot!_

Of cource, there could be a very good explanation for it: they could have been taken. But there's no sign of a struggle, no torn up earth, no small fires, no missile shrapnel. All of the buildings surrounding the area are still standing and Sideswipe doubts the human would go down without a fight.

_He must have left on his own. Stupid species._

((Sideswipe!))

No one is looking over to see him jump.

((Hunter?)) he comms.

((Oh, thank god! You're there! Could you—)) the human breaks off with a curse. Sideswipe can here another voice, what has to be Agent Simmons, yelling.

((What's going on? Where are you?)) Sideswipe says.

((Running.))

He can hear other noises in the background: car horns and humans shouting, a sudden, sharp _bam_ and Hunter's, ((Ah!))

((Hunter, what's going on?)) he says. He backs out, heading for the street.

((It's Machination! Simmons—he must have told them or something. They found us. I blew one up but there's still two more and I can't shake them!))

Sideswipe swears.

((Where are you?)) he says.

((Uh… I—damnit! I said to stop doing that!))

(('I wouldn't have to if you would stop driving like a maniac!')) Simmons voice comes over the comm line.

((Oh, I'm sorry. Am I being _inconsiderate_?))

This is followed by a sharp yelp and a rustle and a _thump_! Then Hunter says, ((Hey! Give me one reason I shouldn't toss you out the door right now, you irritating—))

((Whoa, whoa! Calm down,)) Sideswipe says. He makes a hard right and cuts off a large transport truck. Its horn blares. He's speeding under a bridge. Eight lanes of road whip past above. ((Simmons isn't part of Machination. Just calm down and tell me where you are.))

((Hi Line Drive and Oak Lawn Avenue.))

Sideswipe patches into the communications network and pulls up a map. Hunter is headed into the industrial district.

((Turn left,)) he says.

He's not picking the human up on a scan. He should be able to see him by now. He hits a cross street and turns left, his back end sliding out behind him.

((Keep your comm line open. Keep going down that road until you get to East Levee Street. Take a left and follow that.))

((Okay.))

((You have to stay on that road no matter what. I'm not picking you up on sensors so I won't be able to tell where you are.))

((They've got that, that black hole thing,)) Hunter says. ((I can't scan anything—oh shit!))

Simmons shouts. Sideswipe hears a hiss. A nano-klik later and the comm line fritzes out.

((Hunter?)) He waits. One nano-klik. Two. He takes another left onto another street. The intersection is full of cars. He goes up, onto the sidewalk to get past them and almost takes out a pole in the process. ((Hunter?))

((Jesus Christ!)) the human says. ((Goddamn bazooka!))

((Stay calm,)) Sideswipe says. ((I'm on my way. Follow my directions. Can you do that?))

((Oh yeah, Hunter. Don't get hit by the grenades. It's just like dodge ball! No problem!))

(('Incoming!')) Simmons says.

This time, Sideswipe hears the explosion himself. He's running parallel to the street the human is on. A few blocks up, he spots a puff of smoke. He puts on a burst of speed.

(('Go right! Go right!')) Simmons says.

((I can't!)) Hunter says.

Another explosion. This time, Sideswipe spots a crackling ball of energy. It's an ion cannon. The shops rush past. He glances down a street and catches a flash of yellow.

((I see you!)) Sideswipe says.

He takes the next right. Dirt sprays beneath his tires. He almost takes out a chunk of building. He floors it. A blur of yellow at the mouth of the alley. He's halfway there. Faster, faster, Sideswipe braces himself.

Silver! Sideswipe slams into the car so hard that his optics black out. They come on a nano-klik later and he finds himself _under_ the thing. Then it's up, over his roof and smashing into the pavement behind. Another, terrific crash as the second vehicle plows into the first.

Sideswipe skids for a few metras, his back tires drifting to the side before he can catch himself. He screeches to a stop, facing the smoking, groaning wreckage.

"Go!" he says.

Hunter, stopped behind him, says, "Where?"

Sideswipe surveys the ruined cars one more time. There's no movement within. Over the comm line, he says, ((North. We're going back to the ship.))

* * *

><p>The secretary stares. Jerri ignores her and returns her attention to the painting on the wall. It's a field of sunflowers. The yellows and the golds and the browns swirl together, reflecting the curls of blue in the sky. It's a very interesting design, and very out of place in an office like this.<p>

"Ah, Ms. Stephens!"

She turns, spots the man coming through the door, fiddling with the cuffs of his sleeves. For once, he isn't wearing his hat.

"Mr. Dante," she says with a nod.

Mr. Dante walks up, all smiles, and claps her on the shoulder. Jerri manages not to flinch.

"I hope we didn't keep you waiting too long," he says.

"Not at all."

"Good, good. We see you made it in one piece. Do you need any coffee? Those late night flights can be brutal."

"I'd like that," Jerri says. "Thank you."

Mr. Dante nods and sweeps past her, headed for the door on the far side of the room. Jerri follows. After she passes, she hears the secretary get up, listens to the double-thump of her heels on the carpet as she heads out of the room. Then they're through and into the man's office. Mr. Dante takes a seat behind his expansive desk.

Behind him, the wall is made from floor-to-ceiling windows. An over-extravagant touch; the room is on the second floor and the only view it offers is of the street and the bare lot beyond.

"You mentioned a job?" Jerri says, settling into her own chair.

Mr. Dante blinks. His eyebrows lift. Then the surprise is gone, replaced by that smile again.

"Right to the point, then," he says. "That's what we like about you."

Jerri sits still. No one speaks.

"Well," Mr. Dante says after a moment, "we've got a shipment coming in later, and we were wondering if you'd be willing to make sure it gets here."

"You want me to run security or take care of the delivery itself?"

"Both, if you wouldn't mind."

"My usual rate?"

"Of course."

She sighs. "Where and when?"

Mr. Dante's puppies-and-sunshine grin turns full-blown creepy. The hairs on the back of Jerri's neck stand up.

"We were hoping you'd say that."

* * *

><p>I would say that the only reason I update is for you, Starfire201 and lildevchick. But that would be a lie. I would probably update even if I had no reviews (while weeping bitter, bitter tears into my booze). Knowing there are two people out there who like it, though, is the icing on the cake. So thank you. Hopefully, I won't disappoint. And thank you KayDeeBlu for making sure I don't sound like a <em>total<em> dumbass.

Next chapter: It's You


	9. It's You

**Chapter Nine: It's You**

Hunter feels awful. It's a strange sort of sluggishness in his body. His thoughts are thick and syrupy. He keeps losing track of what he's doing. He's never felt like this, not in this body. He wants to say something, ask Sideswipe if it's normal. But the mech has been brooding since Dallas. Hunter doesn't want to draw his attention.

Simmons has fallen asleep. He's dead weight in the seat. Hunter can feel movements every now and then, an occasional twitch or muscles tensing. Three hours since nearly getting blown up, a day after being taken from his hotel room and then plucked out of a van, and the man has the audacity to snore.

Hunter wonders how long it's been since he's slept.

A long time. The last time he can remember being dead to the world was a week ago, right before waking up in a repo lot in southern Georgia. He had no idea how he'd gotten there. He didn't know why he couldn't hear Sunstreaker anymore. He didn't know why he was alone in his head or why no Autobot would respond to his calls. He didn't know where a week of his life had gone.

((Hunter?)) Sideswipe says.

Reality snaps back. Hunter's right tires skim the edge of the road. He pulls back into his lane and picks up his pace.

((Are you okay?)) Sideswipe says. He's hovering to Hunter's left. He almost sounds concerned.

((I'm fine,)) Hunter says.

It's a lie. Hunter blinks. The images on the screen over his eyes are blurry. The white lines separating the lanes run together.

Suddenly Sideswipe is right there, next to him. Hunter swerves and then catches himself.

_Where did he come from?_

((When was the last time you recharged?)) Sideswipe says.

((Do what?))

The Lamborghini is silent. Hunter's frame tingles; a wave of some sort washes over him from his bumper to his nose. Then the red mech says, ((Thought so. Your energy levels are getting low.))

_That can happen_? Hunter thinks. He gives himself a mental kick. _Of course it can, moron._

((How do I, uh, fix that?)) he says.

((Energon works best. But I don't have any on me and it's too volatile to orbital-jump unshielded. Come on. We're gonna do this the low-tech way.))

((Ookay.))

((Just follow me.))

Sideswipe pulls ahead. A few hundred feet away the lane veers off to the right, toward a rest stop. Hunter can see a low building and some bright blue outdoor tables. Sideswipe leads the way, swooping past the bathrooms and the trashcans chained to metal posts. The two end up parking next to a couple of big rigs off to the side.

((Now what?)) Hunter says, really hoping the answer doesn't involve the words "siphon" or "gas tank."

((Now we recharge.))

Hunter waits. When a program kicks in, like a diagnostic or targeting system, he usually sees some sort of message or icon or diagram pop up on his visor. That isn't happening. Minutes go by. He glances over at Sideswipe.

((So,)) Hunter says. ((Is something supposed to happen?))

((It already is.))

((Huh?))

((You're recharging,)) Sideswipe says.

((Are you sure?))

((Yes.))

The 'bot doesn't move. Inside, Simmons shifts. Across the lot two kids are eating sandwiches with their parents in the back of a minivan. The youngest, a boy with messy, red hair, peels the crust off his bread and drops it beneath the car when his parents aren't looking.

((I don't think it's working,)) Hunter says.

Sideswipe makes a strange, rattling sound. ((Is your armor warm?))

((Yeah.))

((Then it's working.))

The silence is broken only by the whoosh of traffic on the highway behind them.

((But we're in the sun,)) Hunter says.

((Yeah, and that's why it's called _solar_ recharge,)) Sideswipe says. ((I told you: low-tech.))

((Oh.))

In the driver's seat, Simmons lets out a loud snort and Hunter can't help but think that somehow, the man is laughing at him.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe is getting impatient. This is the smart thing to do, the tactical thing. There's no use in charging across half the country with Hunter about to drop into stasis-lock. His own reserves are getting low. It's better to stay in recharge for a bit, let the humans rest.<p>

Still…

The weight of the stolen computer presses on him. He itches to orbital-jump them all back to the ship and get the ship's processor working on cracking the encryption. But the 'jump isn't organic-friendly. Sideswipe had tried it. He'd grabbed one of the white, squawky things that floated above the ship and brought it back to the control room. When he'd rematerialized, he found himself holding a very limp, very dead organic in his hands. Hunter hadn't liked that. He'd liked it even less when Sideswipe had told him that was how he'd gotten the human to the ship in the first place.

Despite that, despite the common sense screaming at him to not go racing off, it takes all of his self-control to hold still. He sweeps the area again. No blank areas, all life forms visual and accounted for. No weapons signatures, no thrum of approaching vehicles, no sign of attack.

It's kind of disappointing.

He needs to relax, let his systems do their job, let the sun soak in. They're gonna be here for a cycle or so. He should spend that time doing something useful, maybe—

He's sinking down on his tires. And it's not on purpose. He tries to straighten out only he can't. He can't move. The world seems to be coming in through a filter, all hazy and slow.

_Ah slag, what's—_

Pain. A distant, grinding pain trickles into his chest, sluggish and awful. He tries to thrash, tries to kick or scream, but he's stuck in his alt-mode and he _can't move_.

_Agh!_

He can only scream in his mind.

The pain tears at him, piece by piece, working its way through his frame, clawing at his mind. He's never felt anything like this.

_Make it stop_, he thinks. _Make it stop!_

He chokes on it, sputters as it clogs his thoughts. Humans talk and laugh and eat metras away. Hunter is right next to him. All of them are oblivious, all unable to help, and Sideswipe can't make a sound.

_What is this?_

Something else brushes along his consciousness. Sideswipe, reeling from it all, almost doesn't notice, _wouldn't_ have noticed, except for the aching familiarity of it.

_Sunny?_

It's his brother, alright. But Sunny doesn't answer, doesn't do anything, just… hovers.

_Come on, bro, answer me_, Sideswipe thinks.

The pain makes it hard to focus. Sideswipe tries to push through it, bat it aside, get to his brother. The harder he tries, the worse it gets.

_Come one, Sunny. I'm right here, you glitching moron._

It's driving him crazy: the pain eats at him. He wants to hit something. Wants to shout or shoot something or do something, anything, to make it go away.

_Slaggit, Sunstreaker!_

Sideswipe senses a shift. It's tiny, more of a whisper, a suggestion.

_Love you_, Sunny says only it isn't in words.

_What_? Sideswipe thinks.

The pain ebbs and begins to fade. So does his brother.

_Sunny, what… no. Oh Primus, no, no, no. Don't you __**dare**__. You hear me, you slag-head? Don't you fragging dare! __**Sunstreaker.**_

* * *

><p>Simmons is pissed.<p>

"What do you mean, you're not gonna open the door?" he says.

"What do you think that means?" the kid says. His voice comes out of the speakers near the floor.

"I think it's cruel and unusual."

"Too bad."

Simmons can only sit and gape at the dashboard. "Well then what the hell am I supposed to do?"

The window to his left rolls down. Simmons spends another few seconds staring at that and then back to the dashboard. "Oh, I don't think so."

"Oh, I do," the kid says.

"What, you want me to just stand up and take aim—"

"I'm not letting you out."

"Where the hell am I gonna go?"

"To find a phone."

"So?" Simmons says.

"So I'm not gonna let you call your buddies again, Simmons. Once was enough."

The pressure on his bladder builds. Simmons can see the bathroom through the windshield, maybe a hundred feet away.

"Look," he says, "I think you're being unreasonable here."

"Really? 'Unreasonable?' They tried to shoot me with a _bazooka_," the kid says.

"I already told you, that wasn't my people."

"A bazooka, Simmons."

"_Red_ already told you. Now would you just—"

"I know you called Machination, you little weasel. You called them and you told them where you were. You told them where to find me and they almost blew me up and you know what? They would have blown you up, too. Because that's how they work and you—"

The kid is really working himself up. Simmons contemplates taking a dive through the window. But the concrete looks hard. He watches some other guy step into the men's room. Simmons sighs.

"—should have left you in that park! Gah!"

Simmons waits a moment. The kid seems to have run himself out.

"Are you done?" he says.

"What?"

"Are you done? With the tantrum, I mean."

"I'll show you tantrum—"

"Because I still need to take a leak and I could have been back already, but no. We're still stuck here, debating about it."

"You would have been holed up with a cell phone."

Simmons reminds himself that he's _inside_ the kid's framework and that kicking him isn't the best idea. "Look, I'll be in there a couple of minutes. If I'm not back out, you can always come in there and get me."

"Yeah right," the kid says. "How am I supposed to do that?"

Simmons blinks. He opens his mouth to ask just how the kid had gotten into his hotel room when, beside them, the red NBE lets out a glass-shattering shriek and blows apart at the seams. Simmons ducks and throws his good arm over his head.

The noise cuts off. Simmons raises his head and peers out through the only undamaged window in a fifty-foot radius. Red shivers and the panels of his car form shudder and slide back together.

"The hell was _that_?" Simmons says.

"Sideswipe?" the kids says.

Red quivers again.

"We're leaving," Red says through the speakers by Simmons's feet.

"Why?" Hunter says. "What's going on? We haven't even been here an hour and—"

"Doesn't matter. We're going. Right now."

"Do you wanna tell me _why?_"

"Hey," Simmons cuts in. "Before you two start planning out the rest of our day, you mind letting me out for a second?"

"What was that?" Red says.

"Simmons," the kid says. "He says he needs to go to the bathroom."

"What's that?"

_For the love of god_, Simmons thinks. "That building right over there."

"Yeah, whatever," Red says. "Hurry up."

"But don't you think he might—" Hunter says.

"No time. And human, you try to pull anything and I'll tear that place apart to get you, got it?"

"Perfectly," Simmons says. When Hunter shows no sign of letting him out, he says, "Well?"

The kid mutters something that sounds an awful lot like "fuck you" and opens the door. Simmons slips out before he can change his mind. He takes a second to stretch, his back popping, and leans against the yellow car.

"Hurry up," Red says.

"Yeah, yeah," Simmons says and takes off for the restroom, whistling.

* * *

><p>"Ma'am?"<p>

Jerri cracks her eyes open and looks up. A man stands next to her chair.

"We've picked up the package," he says.

"You got a visual?" Jerri says. She unfolds her arms and stretches her legs and taps her feet a few times against the floor to shake the pins-and-needles sensation.

"We're waiting on that."

"Tell all teams to stand by," she says.

"Visual confirmation coming up," someone says.

Jerri glances to the back of the van. Three people sit at monitoring stations along the wall. Four more sit across from them, loading their weapons and strapping on their body armor. One of the screens shows an infrared display of a highway. Another shows the same, dark stretch of road; judging from the angle, that footage comes from a dashboard camera. Traffic shifts and she catches a glimpse of the back of some Italian supercar.

"Target confirmed," one of the techies says.

"Divert all local law enforcement channels," Jerri says. "And make sure the cell towers are jammed. Cut off all communication. Teams two and three, get into position and wait for the signal."

"Copy."

Jerri takes a deep breath.

_Time to earn my paycheck. _

* * *

><p>They're being followed. It's hard to tell for sure—on the major roadways, the traffic tends to stay in the same clusters for long stretches and it's harder to keep track in the dark. But there's something about this vehicle that puts Sideswipe on edge and it's not the police decals on the side. Most of those types drive fast. Not this one. It's been hanging back, keeping at least two cars between them.<p>

He waits, to be sure. No use in working up either of the humans for no reason. Another klik. Traffic shifts and the same car still trails behind.

((Hunter,)) he comms, ((let me talk to Simmons.))

A pause, then Simmons says, (('You noticed it, huh?'))

((So it's not just me?)) Sideswipe says.

(('Nope. I've been watching them for the last eight minutes.'))

((What are you guys talking about?)) Hunter says.

(('Our tail,')) Simmons says.

Hunter doesn't respond for a moment. Sideswipe can almost hear his confusion.

((We're being followed,)) he says.

((_What?_)) Hunter is driving in front of Sideswipe. He starts to slow down. Sideswipe edges up and taps his bumper.

((Don't do that,)) he says. ((You'll tip him off.))

The human speeds back up.

((Just keep going,)) Sideswipe says. ((I don't think they'll do anything out here.))

((Oh yeah? How do you think they took Sunstreaker? It was _just like this_. They staged an accident and—))

Sideswipe taps him again. He can hear the panic in the human's vocalizer. They can't afford for him to glitch out. Not now. And Sideswipe can't afford to lose his focus.

((Calm down,)) he says. ((I don't see any others around. It's probably a scout, okay? Just stay calm.))

((Yeah,)) Hunter says. He doesn't sound convinced.

(('Excuse me,')) Simmons says. (('But what are you two talking about?'))

One of the cars behind Sideswipe pulls into the right lane. Only one other vehicle stands between them and the tail.

(('What's the plan?')) Simmons says.

((We bail,)) Hunter says. ((Before more of them show up. We lose him and get the hell back to the ship.))

((No,)) Sideswipe says.

((No? But—))

((We can't lead them back there.))

(('What about taking him out?')) Simmons says.

It'd be easy to put a shot right through the engine block and kill the vehicle. Something is bothering him, though. The police car is too obvious to be a scout or a spy. But there's only one of them. Something doesn't add up. Something isn't right.

(('You do realize that this Machination of yours is probably watching all this, right?')) Simmons says.

((It's not going to do them any good,)) Hunter says. ((Like you said, we need to stop him. We lose him, we get out of here.))

Their tail pulls into their lane. It speeds up.

((They're not following us,)) Sideswipe says. ((This is an attack.))

Both humans are silent. The lights on top of their tail come on. It starts to wail.

((_Shit_.))

((Hunter, go!))

He doesn't need to be told twice. The human leaps ahead. Sideswipe jerks over to the space between the lane and the edge of the road and tears after him.

The other humans are all moving to the right and slowing down. Which helps their tail, but helps Sideswipe more.

((Floor it!)) he says.

The reflectors dividing the lanes blur together as they pick up speed, dodging through the traffic. The tail tries to keep up. It doesn't stand a chance. Soon, the lights and the wailing falls behind.

(('That can't have been it,')) Simmons says.

_No_, Sideswipe thinks. He's already looking, scanning. A sensor block? The faint trace of an ion cannon? _Some_thing.

((What is that?)) Hunter says.

They're coming around a bend. Sideswipe sees a swarm of red and white flashing lights. He picks up the stench of burning. Cars around them slow down. The road begins to congest.

* * *

><p><em>Oh god, oh god<em>, Hunter thinks. He feels sick. Physically ill. He doesn't even _have_ a stomach that he knows about but he feels like he's going to puke.

"Damn," Simmons says.

_Oh god. Shit._

It's the same. It's just like when they caught him the first time, when he'd been inside Sunstreaker, fumbling with the seat belt and watching men with guns running up the lines of cars at him.

"Kid?"

They're screwed. They'll have to stop. They'll hit that traffic jam up ahead and they'll be trapped between an overturned semi on fire and all the people behind them. And then Machination will strike.

A sudden, sharp pain. Hunter's back end leaves the asphalt. He slams back down as Sideswipe backs off.

((_Hunter_,)) Sideswipe says.

((What?))

((Stop! Get off the road!))

((_What?_))

The road is flanked by vast stretches of fields. There are no roads. There's nowhere to go.

Sideswipe hits his brakes. He veers right, plows down the side of the highway and into the ditch.

"Kid!" Simmons says.

Hunter locks his tires, twists around, and plunges off-road. There's a sickening moment of weightlessness and then he slams into the ground. Simmons is thrown against the dashboard. He's still going too fast. A flash of red next to him and Hunter looks forward just in time to see a white fence.

He has no time to swear. He plows into it. Wood shatters over his hood and he's through. The ground is rough, furrowed into sharp lines and small, steep gullies. It's dark and all he can see is the muted green, everywhere, slapping against him.

Simmons curses. One hand digs into his seat, the other clutches the door panel for dear life as he rattles around. Hunter can't pay him any attention. It takes all of his to drive in a straight line. The dirt crumbles under his tires. He keeps fishtailing.

((Sideswipe!)) he says.

((Keep going! There should be a road ahead!))

His undercarriage is getting clogged. He pushes on. A low thrum vibrates the air. It's a helicopter.

_Shit goddamn motherfucker!_

_Are those lights ahead?_

Red, to his right, just ahead. It's Sideswipe.

((Almost there,)) Sideswipe says.

Good. Because any second Hunter is going to shake apart. He can barely see the visor. The field starts to thin. He thinks he catches a glimpse of power lines.

Another fence, this one barbed wire. It screeches along his frame. Hunter pulls free, out onto the flat street.

((Hunter!))

A terrific impact. Hunter's tires leave the road. His vision cuts off. The worst noise he's ever heard: eerie shrieking and part of him knows that's the sound of metal ripping.

* * *

><p>For the second time in a week, Agent Seymour Simmons wakes up to the sound of a car horn going off and the smell of burning engine. His left side hurts. He twitches his arms and legs; they all work. He cracks his eyes open. The side of his head throbs. He reaches up and feels a knot forming behind his left temple.<p>

He's lying halfway on the passenger seat. There's something buried in his right side. He pushes himself up, off the gear stick.

_Not upside down,_ he thinks. It's an improvement from last time.

The windshield is cracked. The dashboard is dark. The car is silent. He's staring out at the night sky over a wheat field.

"Kid?" he says. His voice comes out in a croak.

No answer. He looks to his right.

_Oh_.

They're wedged against a telephone pole—which explains why they're not upside down. He looks to the left. It takes a second for his brain to work out what he's seeing: the grill of an SUV pressed against the left side of the car.

_What the—_

Car doors open. Voices. He blinks. He can't see over the broken hood of the SUV. Except that the noise isn't coming from that car, it's coming from behind. Simmons twists around, hisses through his teeth at the sharp hitch under his ribcage. He looks out the back.

A second SUV, black, with three people climbing out. Three people wearing armor. Three people with weapons.

_Oh fuck_.

Movement. Red and silver and black glinting in headlights. It smashes into the SUV, picks it up off the ground and sends it flying into the field. One of the gunmen bolts. The other two raise their weapons and fire. Something big grabs them, one in each hand, and they disappear. Simmons hears yelling and then silence.

One second. Two. The car pinning them to the pole shifts. Tires screech as it's dragged away. Giant, metal legs come into view and then Simmons is staring NBE Sideswipe in the face.

"You okay?" Red says.

Simmons nods.

"Hunter?"

Simmons shakes his head.

Red sits back and peers down at the kid. Simmons realizes his own mouth is hanging open. He's never seen an NBE move on its own before. Even though it's got to be fourteen, maybe fifteen feet tall, it's not awkward at all, not clumsy like something that big _should_ be. It's all sharp angles, red armor, glowing eyes, all whirring and shifting as Red whirls around in a crouch to look out over the field.

Simmons shakes his head. They're not clear, damnit, and he's gawking like some novice out on his first assignment. It's hard not to. Red stands up. Fifteen feet of robot, moving and talking and—_what the hell are his arms doing?_—and all of it so alive, so—

_What is that?_

Helicopter rotors. A bright light coming in low. Red bends his knees, crouches down.

The kid chooses that moment to return to the world of the living. The lights on the dashboard flicker once and then come back on.

"Ah!" he says.

Sideswipe's head turns. Glowing blue eyes fix on them

"Get out of here!" he says.

"What's going on?" Hunter says.

The helicopter is coming in fast, skimming the field. They'll have guns on board, big guns, guns capable of punching through even the kid's metal hide.

"Go!" Simmons says.

Blue fire erupts from Red's back. He jumps into the air.

"What about Sideswipe?" Hunter says.

"He'll be fine. Go!"

Which is when the light splits into two as the second helicopter peels away from behind the first.

* * *

><p>It's too late for Sideswipe to engage the second helicopter. He's too close to the first one. It thunders past him, headed for Hunter, and then Sideswipe has to look away.<p>

The human craft banks to the right. The door swings into view. The large gun inside opens fire. He tucks his arms in and rolls as the muzzle flashes. Bullets streak past him. He twists to the side and snags the tail.

The craft jerks in the air; rotors scream. The ground sways beneath and the horizon tilts. He can just make out humans shouting something inside. Then one of them is on the side gun again, swiveling it back to point at him.

Two rounds punch through his hip.

_Ah! Slag!_

It's too little, too late. Sideswipe comes in below the gun. He cocks one arm back, the plating all shifted down to form a solid pile-driver. At the last second he turns, the skin of the craft flashes past him. He lashes out.

His fist slams into the side of the helicopter, where the body tapers down into the tail. Metal bends and tears. The craft shudders. Then he's up and away, watching as the tail breaks free and drops. The rest of it, human and machine alike, begin to spiral.

_One down_, he thinks

He searches, finds the road, and looks for headlights. Then he sees Hunter.

* * *

><p>"Move your ass!" Simmons says.<p>

"I am!" Hunter shouts back.

Warning lights flash in his vision. He's messed up. Something inside is broken. The helicopter—some bulky, military thing—bears down on them. Hunter backs out onto the street. Pain throbs in his side.

_Shit, __**shit!**_

He's got to go faster. The damn thing is practically on top of him. Something grinds and he gasps.

"Go! Go!" Simmons says.

He tries.

A roar above him. Hunter looks up and sees the big, black shape hovering. A flash, a hiss, and something hits him, hard. Pain lances through the back of his frame. The visor screams warnings.

Simmons is shouting something about, "Break free!" but Hunter can't focus. Another sharp bolt of agony and he realizes he's being pulled back. A line tethers him to the helicopter. He's been harpooned.

"Kid! Get out of here!"

The helicopter rotates around. He can look up, through the door, and into the thing. Into the barrel of a really big machine gun.

"Fuck!" Simmons says. He throws himself down.

Bullets tear into Hunter. They blow right through his armor, chew up the front of his frame, shred his legs. The pain is hot and awful. He's screaming.

_Agh! Agh! Jesus!_

A rush of motion. Hunter doesn't even see it coming. Something big and fast hits the cable. It wrenches his back end off the ground and spins him around. He slams back to the pavement. The helicopter bobbles.

Sideswipe flips in the air. He's flying. He's flying over Hunter and he's grabbed onto the tether. He drops down. His feet gouge two tracks into the asphalt as he lands. The gunmen are shooting at him. He doesn't seem to notice as he reaches up, wraps the cable around his hands, and _pulls_.

It's like dropping a brick on a kite string. The helicopter jerks down. Sideswipe leaps up. He punches right through the bottom. The entire, spinning rotor pops off the top like a champagne cork. They both plummet. At the last second, Sideswipe detaches himself. The helicopter smashes into the ground. Sideswipe hits, rolls, and comes up in a crouch twenty feet away.

"Wow," Simmons says.

Amidst the critical errors and hull integrity warnings and the overwhelming pain, Hunter sees signals cropping up on his visor. Five of them coming down the road at them, coming from the north.

"Can you move?" Sideswipe says. He's limping. Shimmering pink and blue liquids run down his right leg.

Hunter doesn't even have to run a diagnostic. "No."

Sideswipe scowls.

"How did they find us?" Hunter says. "How do they keep finding us?"

"It's you."

"What?" Hunter says.

"They're tracking you. They've _been_ tracking you the whole time. It's how they knew you were at Epsilon Holdings."

"But… _how_?"

Sideswipe shrugs. "They probably put a tracker into all the Headmaster units. A way to know where you were, a way to keep control."

Hunter's head spins. Even Simmons has stilled.

"Is there a way to get it out?" Hunter says.

Sideswipe doesn't answer. He looks north.

"Sideswipe? We're gonna get out of here, right?"

The mech turns and Hunter can see the hard look on his face. He hobbles over, kneels down. Hunter waits as he peers at him. Then Sideswipe reaches inside himself and pulls out something small and shiny. His hand slips underneath Hunter's frame.

"Sideswipe?" Hunter says.

"I'm sorry."

The air around the 'bot shimmers. Green flashes streak upwards.

"What's going on?" Simmons says. "What is that?"

Hunter can only stare in horror as the streaks combine into one. With a flash and a rush of air, Sideswipe disappears. Hunter is left sitting on the torn-up road, next to the smoking wreckage of a helicopter, staring at the empty spot where Sideswipe had been. In the distance, a cluster of headlights appears. Machination closes in.

* * *

><p>This chapter was a mess until KayDeeBlu pointed out that I get carried away with the action sequences. She saved you from a lot of tediousness. Like, really. Starfire201 and lildevchick, please don't throw bricks at me. And thank you for your reviews. They mean a lot.<p>

Next Chapter: He's Here


	10. He's Here

**Chapter Ten: He's Here**

_- One week ago -_

It's wrong. It's all wrong. The images… oh Primus, the _images._

Sideswipe kneels next to a pile of rusted pipes. To his right, the thing that is _not_ his brother lies moaning and twitching. Sideswipe wipes his mouth, turns away from the puddle of energon seeping into the dirt, and tries to stand. His limbs are shaking too much. He ends up flopping into a sprawl.

He can see it, what they've done to Sunny. His head suspended from the ceiling, plating torn off, his face mangled. Those… those _meat-bags_ forged a connection, an unnatural hard-link, forced themselves into his brother's head and _took_ his thoughts, his emotions, everything that makes him Sunny.

_Headmaster_. That word is burned into his memory. Little echoes of his brother's spark-resonance. Little ghosts of Sunny.

There's a strange buzzing in the air. Sideswipe shakes his head, tries to clear it, but the sound persists, burning into his thoughts.

Headmasters. At least five of them. Separated from each other, confused. A gap in their collective memory, a flash of white and pain and nothingness until two planetary rotations ago when this one—_Gordan_—woke up alone.

Something taps his foot. He looks up. The Headmaster—no, the _thing_—is on its hands and knees. It's trying to crawl away. It whimpers, calls for help. Sunny had called for Sideswipe at the end, lying strapped to a table while the humans skittered across him, ripped him to pieces. He'd called and no one had answered. He'd been alone.

The next thing Sideswipe knows he's scrambling up. He tackles the Headmaster and they both go down. The thing reaches up and claws at his face. Sideswipe ducks back, shifts his arm, and punches.

Misses.

The thing screams. Its shoulder is crushed. Sideswipe cuts the power to his audios.

He hits it again, catches one of the sensor fins—Sunny's fins. Another hand reaches up and fingers latch onto his mouth. Sideswipe bites down. The hand tries to pull away but he grabs it, pulls the arm taut, and smashes it with his other hand. Armor dents, rips apart, energon sprays. He can feel it tingling as it drips down his face. He tosses the hand—Sunny's hand—away. The thing bucks beneath him. It needs to hold still. It needs to stop moving.

It needs to stop _existing_.

He hits it in the face. Its head knocks back, smacks into the ground. It shudders. Still moving. Still there. It needs to _go away_. He hits it again and again, with both hands, one after the other. Over and over and over. It stops trying to grab him. It stops trying to fight him. The horrible mockery of Sunny's face buckles and caves in. He can feel the change, can feel it grow soft as liquid spatters and spreads beneath it. It's not energon.

Slowly, the world comes back into focus. The buzzing has gone. He can't feel the phantom signal of his twin anymore. His hands are wet. He straddles the mangled, yellow remains, looks down at the flattened mess that had been its head. His hands are _filthy_.

Sideswipe throws himself to the side, kicks away, and purges his tanks.

Eventually, his arms stop shaking. He can pick himself up, swaying on his legs. The construction site is dark. Lights have come on in the houses across the street.

_Humans._

They'll be out here to see what the commotion was. For one, terrible moment, rage wells inside him. The sight of those dwellings, the life forms inside; this miserable planet and it's disgusting, soft inhabitants. It would be easy to go over there and rip into them, smash them, smear them all over the road.

_Headmasters_. It's the Headmasters he's after. They're the ones who took his brother. They're the ones who are going to pay. There is nothing in the universe that will stop him from _obliterating_ Machination.

He can sense the other five signals. They're faint, but they're there. One of them must know where Sunny is. He doesn't care how long it takes, _what_ it takes, he will find Sunny. And he will wipe those things off the face of the planet.

* * *

><p><em>- Present day -<em>

Sideswipe materializes on the deck of Jetfire's ship and collapses against one of the command consoles. His right leg refuses to take his weight.

Sensing his movement, lights come on throughout the deck. It's quiet. And empty.

He pushes off the console and hobbles over to the wall. He leaves a trail of energon on the floor. He waves a hand over the door sensor, waits for it to slide open, and starts to drag himself down the hall toward the lab.

It takes a few kliks to get there and he flops onto one of the medical berths with a groan. He lays there for a moment, leaking all over the place, before he can convince himself to sit up. The medical tray is still there, on the other side of the berth, where he left it after patching Hunter up. He paws it over and sets to work. Nothing too serious. The bullets had gone straight through. They'd punctured an energon line and clipped his main coolant one, but it's nothing that'll kill him.

_I wonder if they left Hunter alive?_

He shakes his head. He doesn't have time to think about that. Sunny doesn't have time.

He stops the leak, patches the lines. He starts to weld his armor back together.

Hunter had been on this berth. He'd lain right there. He'd tried so hard to mask how terrified he was. He'd done alright, for a human.

Almost half a cycle it takes to finish. When he's done, he slides off the berth. His leg aches, but it holds.

There's an access port into the ship's processor in the lab. Sideswipe finds it, formats his hand into a jack, and plugs in. He scans. Less than a klik later, the ship picks up a tracer signal.

On the covering over his optics, a map appears. There's a glowing blip in the center of it, moving north. Machination has taken the bait.

"_Sideswipe? We're gonna get out of here, right?"_

Sunstreaker could be anywhere on this mud-ball. If Sideswipe wants to find him in time, he needs information, information he won't get chasing drones around. He needs to find one of their facilities. He needs to find where they would take a captured Headmaster.

When that blip stops, when his tracer stops, Sideswipe will strike.

* * *

><p>Hunter is cold. He's lying on something hard, something that rattles. He can't move. There's a terrible pressure crushing his legs and arms and chest. He thinks his eyes are open, but it's hard to tell. It's dark, wherever he is, and he feels funny, like he's swimming. He feels sick.<p>

Time passes. Sometimes he hears voices jumbled together, in and out, and then it's quiet again. Sometimes it's rattling and he's swaying back and forth, like that time Dad took Megan and him out on the lake. When Mom still talked to him, before everyone died or left him.

A sudden bump and he's sure his eyes are open and looking at a face, one he knows. A man, older, with dark hair and a graying goatee and glasses. The man reaches up and Hunter feels a dim pain in his neck and his body goes cold again.

_Ha! Cold robot boy!_

Another thump. He tries to open his eyes but they're too heavy. He manages to turn his head. It takes forever. His cheek presses against the hard surface. More voices. Someone touches his face.

Moving again. He's swaying. He can see Dad's face. He's smiling, helping Hunter keep the fishing rod from bending all the way beneath the boat. Hunter wants to drop it. He doesn't want the fish to drag him in the water where Megan said the turtles will eat him.

"Hey, calm down, kiddo," Dad says. He takes the rod in one hand—they're so large—the other, he places on Hunter's back. "We'll do this together, okay? And then we can show Mom what you caught."

He remembers standing next to the grave and looking at Mom. Her sister, his Aunt Jean, holds her and even though it's her husband they're lowering into the ground, her eyes are dry and blank. Megan is silent next to him. Her face is puffy and her eyes are bloodshot. He looks back to the shiny casket sitting on the fake lawn. It doesn't seem real.

He hears a hiss.

Mom is sprawled out on her stomach on the couch. One leg hangs off the side. He sighs and sets his keys on the counter and walks over, picking his way through cartons of half-eaten takeout. The only light comes from the muted TV across the room. He reaches the couch and pulls the throw-blanket off the back. He drapes it over her still form. He can smell the alcohol on her. He's careful not to touch her any more than necessary. The last time she woke up after one of these binges, Megan ended up with a black eye and three stitches.

"…know it's not what you were expecting," a man says.

"That's alright. We needed…"

He cracks an eye open. Everything is hazy, a blur, moving shapes.

"…expect a recovery?"

"I see no reason why not. We'll have to take him down to the lab first, get him fixed up. Fluid levels have dropped dangerously low and he'll need a complete flush." A pause. "I'll get started, then. It should take an hour, two at most."

"Good." This voice is deeper. It speaks with a southern drawl. "We'd like to know what you find."

"I've got a theory on that. Nothing concrete, mind you, and I won't be able to test it until he's fully conscious, but I think it has something to do with the, ah, organic factor. I suspect that when the link was severed, the human mind managed to absorb most of the shock. Not without damage, of course. Which explains the lack of activity until last week."

"So they're no longer connected? At all?"

"I don't believe so, no."

"Interesting."

"I'm eager to see if there were any other side effects."

Another long pause. He hears cloth rustling.

"Well, you let us know when you get started."

"I will, sir."

Footsteps. Hunter turns his head again, sees a door swinging shut. He hears a click and a rattle.

_Wha…_

There's something else there, another presence. A _familiar_ presence. His eyes don't want to move and it takes minutes, and then he's looking up, through a glass window into an empty room, into darkened optics of a robotic head.

_Hey. That's…_

"Okay, let's get you down to the repair bay," a man says. The room moves as Hunter is wheeled away.

* * *

><p>Simmons is in deep shit. He's handcuffed to a chair in a room with two goons standing by the door. He thinks he might have a concussion. His left shoulder does not like the way he's been cuffed. <em>He<em> doesn't like the way he's been cuffed. He likes it even less when the door opens and another goon walks in and Simmons catches a glimpse of the small, black case he's carrying. It's not big; about the size of his iPhone. But the real kicker is what's inside it.

"Is this really necessary?" he says.

He doesn't expect an answer, so he's not disappointed when he fails to get one. The man with the case comes to a stop next to Simmons. He sets it down on the cheap table, unzips the case, and starts to pull its contents out.

"I mean, seriously," Simmons says. "It's a bit overkill. I'll tell you whatever it is you think I know."

The last thing to come out is the syringe. The goon pulls on a pair of latex gloves; he screws on the needle, and picks up the glass vial. To Simmons's cynical eye, the movement looks practiced.

"Not that I actually know anything, I mean. You guys," he says and looks around the room. "This is very professional. Very serious. But hey, mistakes happen, right?"

They're not even looking at him. The goon steps up. One of his buddies leaves the door and comes to stand behind Simmons. Hands clamp onto his shoulders and hold him down as the man with the needle rolls up Simmons's shirt sleeve. He pulls out an alcohol pad and swipes Simmons's arm.

"I hate this part," Simmons mutters. The needle sinks into his skin and he feels a cold burning.

* * *

><p>Matt Summers isn't paying attention to the screen in front of him. He's too busy balancing his chair on two legs. Outside, the parking lot is quiet, the air dead and still. He reaches for his now-cold cup of coffee when a burst of light flashes through the booth's tiny window. He starts to straighten.<p>

Wind blasts through. The chair falls back and Matt tumbles to the ground, landing on his back with his legs in the air.

"Shit!" he says.

He rolls to the side, starts to pick himself up.

"The _fuck_?"

He looks outside. At first, his brain doesn't really register it. It's not until his gaze travels up that he sees the head and the _face_.

It's a goddamn giant robot. It's crouched right outside his booth, staring at the warehouse behind him.

"Oh Christ," Matt says.

The robot's head turns. Its glowing eyes fix right on him. Matt hears himself moan and he's backing away, even though there's nowhere to go. The giant moves, a piece of it rises into the air. It's a leg. Matt has enough time to realize this and then it rushes at him.

* * *

><p>Jerri Stephens splashes cold water onto her face. She runs her wet hands through her hair and then pulls a handful of paper towels out of the dispenser. She pats herself dry and heads back out into the locker room. Her headache is coming back. She reaches into her locker and pulls out a bottle of Tylenol. She drops that into her bag and starts to zip it up when the lights flicker. She pauses. The ground rumbles.<p>

She waits. Less than a second and the lights flicker again. Off in the distance something big goes _boom!_

The explosion is distant, maybe two stories up, at ground level.

She stuffs the rest of her gear into her bag and slings it over her shoulder. She stops long enough to grab a weapon before she opens the door. To the right is the elevator. She turns left, toward the stairs.

Somewhere above her, someone starts shooting.

* * *

><p>Dr. Paul Berkman stares with growing alarm at the security monitors as, one by one, they blink out. He takes a deep breath and wipes his glasses with the bottom of his shirt.<p>

"Are you sure this is going to work?" he says.

He puts the glasses back on. Behind him comes a deep, whirring grind. Another monitor picks up the intruder, the large, red body moving shockingly fast across the room. He can see flashes near the floor where the guards open fire. The robot doesn't even slow down, even though Dr. Berkman knows that the guns are more than capable of piercing the thing's armor.

The robot scoops up one of the security golf carts and chucks it across the floor like a bowling ball. The flashes stop. Then it turns and looks into the camera. Its right shoulder shifts. A very large cannon unfolds. A bright flash and the monitor cuts off.

Hydraulics hiss and Dr. Berkman turns, watching the immense form rise.

"Quite sure," a deep voice says. It carries no trace of the familiar drawl. Dr. Berkman has heard it numerous times, yet the synthesized voice still sends a shudder up his spine.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe stands in the middle of the burning and screaming and scowls.<p>

_This place is a fragging maze_, he thinks.

The hallways are large. Far larger than a human would need. He can walk upright with room to spare.

Humans scurry everywhere. A couple of them take shots at him, but he's beyond patience. His ion cannon vaporizes their weapons and the occasional limb.

He moves deeper into the building. The entire place is blocked; he can't get a reading on anything. More humans appear in the hallway. He blasts the ceiling over their heads. They scatter as it comes down.

_Where would they stash what they don't want found?_ he thinks.

More of them swarm behind him.

Bullets _snap_ and _twang_ through the air by his head. Some sort of miniature explosive grazes his leg. It skips down the hall and detonates. Shrapnel blows through the air. Sideswipe ducks and shields his face with his arms.

The only option is to go down. He can hear reinforcements. They're small, but their weapons can do some damage and there are enough of them to surround him, pin him there, keep him busy.

They're stalling him.

Farther down is a set of smaller doors. Sideswipe backs toward them. They open up into a lift. It's way too small for him, but where there's a lift, there's a shaft, and the walls are so thin. He punches right through it. He tears and stomps until the hole is big enough to squeeze through. He sticks his head in.

The top of the lift is right there. He sets his left foot on it. It dips beneath his weight. Sideswipe grins.

He pulls back out and blasts the floor in front of another massing group of squishies. Then he reaches in and wraps his hands around the cables holding the lift up. He hops in.

The cables, already pulled taut, stiffen and squeal. Something overhead groans. Sideswipe looks up.

He jumps and comes down hard.

It's too much. The lift rips free and he falls.

* * *

><p>Jerri is almost to the stairwell when she hears the roaring. Seconds later and the elevator doors burst open in a shower of sparks. A cloud of dust billows into the hallway. She stumbles back, pulls a shirt up over her mouth and nose. She can hear something else: metal screeching. It's coming from inside the walls.<p>

"Goddamn," she says.

She has a pretty good idea what's coming down that shaft. She turns and runs. The screeching gets louder. A minute later and something goes _whump!_ A clang. The crunch of the walls being torn apart.

She passes a set of double, hangar-type doors. The ground shakes. Metal squeals. Another hangar door, one of the big, sliding ones. Just beyond it, she spots a smaller, people-sized door. Another tremor and the walls actually ripple and then she feels more than hears the large object tumble out.

Jerri grabs the door handle, throws it open, and freezes.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe stumbles out into a deserted corridor. Rubble spills onto the floor, crunches beneath his feet. He can hear human voices above, human voices to the left, but they're distant. There's no one waiting for him. He pauses.<p>

_Where to go?_

The hallway to his right ends in a couple hundred metras. It's lined with three large, sliding doors. The hallway to his left leads deeper into the building, into the heart of the complex.

There's no one to stop him.

He huffs. His cannon hums next to his head as he starts down the hall. It's quiet. The lights flicker. A human-sized door is just ahead. He thinks he hears scuffling inside.

Something in his chest flutters.

Sideswipe stops.

_What?_

It's there again, soft, weak, a whisper. It's his spark. It's something pulling at his spark.

_No_, he thinks.

Sideswipe turns around.

Three doors and the end of the hallway. Three doors and something else, something tugging at him. Some_one_. There's only one person in the universe connected to him, one person able to call to him like this.

_No way. There's no way._

Scanners are useless; he can't even tell which way he's pointed. It doesn't matter. That presence draws him. Past one of the doors, two of them, over to the third. He stops outside.

_Sunny?_

It's so weak. He's barely there. What should be a blazing presence is a trickle, choked with pain. Sideswipe lifts a hand and sets it on the door. This close and he should be able to _see_ his brother's resonance.

_No way. There's no way they would lead me here. It's too convenient. Something's wrong._

And yet he can't turn away. His legs lock. His arms reach up of their own accord. Fingers slip into the small gap between the doors. He _heaves_. They slide open.

_Sunny… oh Primus_.

There, on a pedestal across a large room dotted with small, black things, is his brother's severed head.

A flash and blinding pain and Sideswipe reels back, hands clawing at his face, trying to clear the burning from his optics. His back hits a wall. He stumbles and slides down. He can hear popping, hissing as humans shoot at him.

He lashes out with one hand. Small things crumple against his arm. They keep shooting. He brings his legs up, curls in on himself, protecting his chest and neck and head. Optics reboot. They flicker once, twice—one doesn't come back on at all. The other seems strangely bare and he realizes that the cover is gone, half-melted from whatever they exploded in his face.

The air buzzes. He can see the meat-bags in the room, coming out into the hallway, fanning out around him. Behind them is the room. Behind them is Sunstreaker. His brother's head stares back with dark, dead optics.

Sideswipe kicks both legs out. Humans go flying. Then he's surging up, rolling across the floor. He grabs one of the doors in both hands and rips from the ceiling.

Some of the humans see what he's about to do and start to run. Sideswipe lifts the door in front of him like a shield and then throws himself down. He hits the ground. Something beneath crunches.

He's in the room. Sunny is right there, within reach.

_I'll get you out of here_.

A hiss. Sideswipe starts to turn. A small piece of metal hits him on the side and sticks there. He has a nano-klik to wonder why it's not doing anything.

Sideswipe is hit by a wall of _agony_. He can't see, can't hear, can't think. Warnings scream in his mind but they don't make any sense. He sees blue and white. His circuits burn.

Blank. Nothing.

Loud whirring; sounds close. Dark. No… not right. Warning. Warning.

_Am I dead?_

Crunching. Another sound. Softer, organic. Babbling, nonsense language.

_I must be dead._

A hand brushes his face. He knows it's a hand. He's not sure how, but he does. A presence, too. Warm, familiar. Soothing. The burning starts to fade.

He can't hear words; they're _not_ words, but they're there just the same and he knows it's Sunny.

_You have to get up_, is what he hears.

_Too hard_, he thinks.

_Get up._

_Don't want to._

_Get up._

_No._

"…got it."

"Don't get too close."

"I've got more people out here! We need med-evacs, now!"

"I _told_ you, they're on their way."

Voices, human, maybe four of them speaking. More low groans, someone whimpering.

Sideswipe's vision is gray. For one, terrifying nano-klik, he's sure he's gone blind. Then he spots movement to one side and he realizes he's looking down at the floor. The door. Close enough.

It's hard to think through the lingering haze of pain, but he thinks he's lying on one arm, his legs twisted beneath him. Something scrapes nearby. The door trembles with human footsteps.

_What the slag did they hit me with?_

He waits and listens. Four humans; he can make out their intakes. One next to him, by his left shoulder; another in the hallway. Two more by his feet. He can't see his right hand, trapped under his chest. He wiggles his fingers and succeeds on the third try.

_Primus, that hurts._

His other limbs function: right leg, left leg, left hand.

"Did you see that?"

Sideswipe freezes.

"See what?"

"I think it moved."

The meat-bag by his shoulder doesn't say anything. He feels a minute tremor in the door as the humans start to ease away.

"Hey, Stephens, was it? Circle around, see if you can't—"

Sideswipe reaches out. Fingers wrap around a small, thrashing object. He pushes himself up on one arm and glares at the thing.

The other humans freeze. Then the two by his feet lift their weapons. One of them has something big set on its shoulder.

He doesn't give it the chance to use it. He shoves across the floor. Metal squeals. He kicks. He catches both of them and they go flying into a wall. They land in a heap and neither of them gets up. The fourth human doesn't bother. It runs.

_Oh no you don't._

He lurches to his feet and stumbles out the door. The fleeing human has gone maybe a metra. It's not far enough. Sideswipe cocks back his arm—the organic in his hand shouting—and throws.

The human lets out a shrill scream as it soars through the air. It hits its companion and they both go down in a flurry of limbs. They lay unmoving.

_Sunny_.

There's just his head in there, hooked onto a pedestal. Glowing, pink lines of energon run up to his neck. His brother doesn't react at all. His eyes don't move. His head is still.

_Where's his spark?_

Sideswipe circles the pedestal. He doesn't see it anywhere.

_It's got to be here._

The spark _is_ the 'bot. Without it, Sunny's head is just a data collection, a drone with no feelings, no emotions. It's Sunny's memories, but it's not _him_.

_What the slag did they __**do**__?_

It's not natural. What Machination has done to him, tearing his essence out and leaving it bare to the world…

Sideswipe shudders.

A flutter in his mind.

_Sunstreaker?_ he thinks. He reaches for Sunny's head. _What is it?_

He's not sure what tips him off. Maybe it's Sunny or maybe it's the subtle shift in lighting or maybe his audios register some small noise. Either way, Sideswipe looks over his shoulder.

Someone is standing there. He has a moment to register this, register the thing's sheer size. It's Cybertronian, a mech, standing on two legs. He stares into the orange visor over its optics. The thing cocks its head to one side.

"Ah," it says.

It moves. Sideswipe brings his arms up, tries to block it but pain rips—

* * *

><p>KayDeeBlu points out when the zipper is showing on this thing. And lildevchick lets me know when I'm doing alright. Thank you both.<p>

Next chapter: Déjà Vu.


	11. Déjà Vu

**Chapter Eleven: Déjà Vu**

_God, what a mess._

Dr. Paul Berkman adjusts the glasses on his nose. He steps to the side as another team with a stretcher rushes past. It's the mercenary, the blonde: Stephens, he thinks her name is. The woman isn't moving. Her skin has taken on an ashen color.

They're getting the hangar door off the ground. They have to cut it away, piece by piece, to get at the casualties trapped underneath. The room is filled with the cries of the wounded.

It's well worth the prize.

Dr. Berkman can see the rainbow sheen of pink spattered around the room. It looks like a lot—there's even some on the ceiling—but Mr. Dante had assured him that it wasn't anything to worry about. The target was quite large, after all. And all they really needed was the head and the power source, both of which Mr. Dante left intact.

God, it had been a brute. Dr. Berkman had seen the whole thing on the surveillance cameras. Fifteen dead and more than forty wounded so far. The ground floor was demolished, elevator number three destroyed. It'll take weeks before everything is back in order.

He'd gotten a look as they hauled it out, started to take it down the hall to bay three. It was a mess. The plastic covering the thing's eyes were gone—melted off. The shoulder mounted weapon was scrap. One of the legs was mangled, the chest partially crushed, whole sections of armor torn away. He's going to have to go in, but the damage to the face should make things easier. Dr. Berkman knows better than anyone how hard it is to crack the thick shell covering the processor. But that gap around the eyes…

Dr. Berkman picks his way through the battlefield over to the pedestal. Hub One is silent, as usual. He checks the vital signs to be sure. Minimal activity. The thing is useless. Dr. Berkman had suggested scrapping it and starting over, but Mr. Dante had refused.

"We've got a, well, you'd call it a hunch, Dr. Berkman," he'd said.

Dr. Berkman shakes his head. Though it appears that the "hunch" had been correct. He surveys the room again.

_It went straight here,_ he thinks, _as though it knew. Strange._

His cell phone vibrates in his pocket. He pulls it out.

"Sir?" the assistant on the other end says. "We're ready."

Dr. Berkman checks his watch. "I'll be there in five minutes."

He slips the phone back into his pocket. He casts one, last look around and sighs.

"And you had such potential," he says.

Hub One doesn't respond.

"Ah well. I'm sure this will work out much better."

He turns away. He doesn't see the Hub's mouth twitch. He doesn't see the optics dilate. He doesn't hear the sound it makes.

"Ssss-dzzzz."

* * *

><p>Pain.<p>

Everything is pain.

His audios shriek. Agony rips through him, claws up his neck, and lodges in his head, digging hot talons through his mind.

_Primus._

Burning, searing heat gives way to icy cold. And he doesn't know where he is or if he's anywhere at all. He needs to squirm, needs to thrash, needs the hurting to stop.

It doesn't.

A quiet whine. A hiss. The awful din around him eases and, for one moment, Sideswipe feels a trickle of relief. And then something taps him on the head.

Optics online and he jerks. A harsh, guttural cough of static erupts from his vocalizer. It almost blows out.

Lights. His one, functioning optic is blinded by them. He tries to lift a hand to shield his face. It won't move.

_Wha…?_

He turns his head to find out why.

_Agh, it hurts too much for me to be dead._

A shadow moves. Someone blocks the light. A face blurs into view. Cybertronian. Something is wrong with the mech's face.

"Who are you?" he tries to say. It comes out a garbled slur.

The unfamiliar mech cocks his head. Sideswipe realizes he's smiling. Something cold seeps through his chest.

He tries again. "Who…?"

Better. Recognizable, if half-slagged.

"Ah, you're online," the mech says. The voice is deep, resonating. There's something about the words, something about the inflection that sets Sideswipe on edge.

"What?" he says. He means to say, "What the slag do you want?" but it's too hard to put the words together.

The mech doesn't seem to hear him.

"We were wondering if we'd gone overboard," it says. "It can be so difficult to remember one's strength. You break so easily."

Sideswipe can only squint at him. _The slag is he talking about? What—_

The room. The big mech. Trying to dodge the swing coming at him only he's too slow, the thing too fast, and he can't get out of the way. It slams into him, spins him around, he catches a glimpse of Sunny's head—

"You!" Sideswipe says. He jerks up. Or tries to. Because something presses against his chest. He can't sit up, can't move.

_Oh no._

He's _tied down._

Sideswipe thrashes, tries to rip himself free. Energon spatters. Something inside him shifts and the agony flares. The next thing he knows he's lying flat on his back, staring up at the ceiling.

"Calm down, now," the big mech says. "You'll only wear yourself out and you're going to need all of your energy."

_That_ sets off alarms.

"The slag do you mean?" he says.

The mech grins at him. "Oh, no need to go and ruin it for you. The surprise is half the fun."

_What is wrong with that thing's face?_ The mech stands silhouetted against the light, his face hidden in the gloom. But there's something… the way the plating sits together that's just _wrong_.

Seams. Big ones, running across it like a road map. It's not a face, it's a jumble of pieces locked together to suggest a face. He's seen this before: on Hunter, on all the Headmasters.

"What _are_ you?" he says.

The mech gives a short bow. "You may call us Scorpinok."

"What is this place? What…"

They're not alone. There are humans in the room, too, clustered on the floor beneath him, some standing on the edge of the table he's strapped to. Other shapes along the walls: tools, equipment. They're all silent, all waiting, all watching this freak standing over him.

"It's you," he says. "You're the one… you're Machination."

The mech, no, the _thing_ laughs.

"You worked it out! And so quickly, unlike poor Sunstreaker."

Sideswipe snarls.

"He had no clue," Scorpinok says. "Kept babbling threats, even as we started to cut into him."

Sideswipe's audios ring. He finds he can't move, can only stare up at the monster as it talks, not even looking at him, anymore. Can only lie there and feel the cold burn its way through him.

"That didn't last long. Soon he was begging us to stop. It was too late, of course. Though he asked so _nicely_."

His vision swims. The table seems to be swaying. His body feels off, like he's floating. Pressure builds. He's going to pop, going to explode, going to burst off the table and _bury_ his fingers into that freak's face and tear it off while it screams—

_Tap-tap_.

A pincher clicks against his helm. The room shifts back into focus. The _thing_ still looms over him.

"You know, when you first showed up, we thought you might have been the first of a rescue operation," the freak says. "But you had such a knack for finding our Headmasters. It took some time to figure out. We weren't sure, you see. It wasn't until we found what was left of Mr. Jones that we knew."

_What the slag is it—oh._

"He was the first one you found, wasn't he? Quite the mess you made of him. Very personal touch. You hid the remains so well, we would never have found him if it hadn't been for the tracker, but I'm sure you know all about that. That was how you found your way here, is it not? Mr. O'Nion? You're Sunstreaker's twin, aren't you? What was the name? Sideswipe?"

The burning fills him. He doesn't feel anything else, just the awful cold.

"I'm going to kill you," Sideswipe says.

"Your brother said the same thing," Scorpinok says.

He backs away. The humans move in. The whine of machinery fills the air as a laser-cutter lifts over him and sinks into his chest.

* * *

><p>He's awake. No gradual awareness, no dream sequence, no slow return to the senses. One moment, nothing; the next, he's staring up at the ceiling. Boom.<p>

_What the hell?_

And he feels good. Not at all like the half-dead zombie he was earlier. His legs don't even hurt—

Hunter almost flails. He almost bolts upright, which probably would have ended with him rolling off the table and crashing to the floor and totally blowing his cover to the two voices he hears. Instead, he catches himself and concentrates on staying very, very still.

_Oh god._

He remembers. The helicopter, Sideswipe, Simmons scooting forward, pressing his face to the windshield to get a better look as the red mech dematerialized and _left him there_. Machination.

_Oh my god._

They have him. Machination has him again. It's some god-awful case of déjà vu.

Hunter turns his head and looks around. He's in a room, fluorescent lights overhead. The walls are white, the floor is tiled. He's lying on his back on what looks like stainless-steel, what looks like an autopsy table.

He shudders.

Two voices, both male, chat away outside the door. He looks to his left and freezes.

_What is __**that**__?_

It's a tube. It's curving up and away from… from his neck. A ripple of cold nausea washes through him. Hunter lifts one hand to run his fingers up his shoulder until they hit where the tube connects. It's filled with dark, thick liquid. It's coming out of what looks like a water cooler.

_Oh. Shit, I… oh._

He has to calm down. He can't freak out. Not here, not now. Those two guys in the hall will be coming back in. He's got to get out of here. And that means staying calm, keeping his head.

_You can do this. Figure it out._

The tube. He's got to disconnect it. Both hands now, probing where it sticks out of his neck. He doesn't want to touch it. Touching it means making it real and if it's real—

There. A clasp of some sort around the base holds it in. He starts to twist it—_oh god, get it off me_—and then stops.

_What if it sets off an alarm?_

His hands fall back. He stares dumbly at the water cooler and its viscous content.

He's seen it before, when he got shot the first time. That stuff had bled out of his shoulder. The black goo smeared on his palm where he clapped a hand over the wound.

It's… it's like blood, only for his cyborg body.

_That is so goddamn creepy_, he thinks.

A click; the door handle turns. Hunter pulls his arms back to his sides and closes his eyes.

"—and it's not like they don't have the staff for it."

"I know. It's ridiculous. Berkman's been tearing his hair out all week."

A snort. Hunter can hear the squeak of shoes on the tile.

"And now this," the first guy says. "It's too much, you know? It came right through the front entrance. It's fishy, you know?"

"What do you mean?"

"That's one hell of a coincidence. We get one, and then another just _shows up_ on the doorstep? I've always said we don't give them enough credit. They must have found a way to talk to one another."

The first guy, Mr. "Fishy" comes to a stop next to Hunter's head.

"What, you think they planned it?" the second one says.

"I dunno. It's just… oh." Fingers on his neck. The guy leans over. Hunter can feel the body heat radiating onto his face. "It's done."

He cracks an eye open. Blue, the edge of what looks like one of those scrub shirts. He shuts his eye.

"Could you get that for me?" Mr. Fishy says.

Movement above him; something soft brushes his nose. He smells some kind of aftershave. A click and a slight tug on his neck and the tube is gone.

"Get the door, would you?" Mr. Fishy says.

"Yeah," the second guy says.

The table starts to move. They're rolling him across the floor, taking him out, into the hall. He opens his eyes.

Mr. Fishy is right over Hunter. He's pushing the table. The lower half of his face is covered in one of those paper doctor's masks; his hair is tucked up under a blue, paper cap. He looks like he's about to go into an operating room.

Mr. Fishy adjusts his grip on the table, looks down, and meets Hunter's eyes.

"Hi," Hunter says.

Mr. Fishy's eyes bug out. He recoils from the table.

The second man stops. He looks back. Hunter doesn't give him time to react. He sits up, lunges forward, snags the back of the guy's scrubs. The man stumbles. Hunter's fist catches him right under the chin. Teeth clack together. His head snaps back and he goes limp.

Mr. Fishy backs away, hands up, eyes wide. Hunter drops the second guy and swings his legs over the table railing. Mr. Fishy's eyes dart from the half-empty water cooler to Hunter. His hands shoot out, grab the top of it. The next thing Hunter knows it's flying through the air, right at his head.

He ducks. Mr. Fishy scrambles past to the left. Hunter catches a fistful of cloth and pulls. Mr. Fishy flails; one of his feet manages to tangle with Hunter's and they both go down.

Mr. Fishy makes an "oomph!" sound. Hunter lands with a crash. Then Mr. Fishy is up, feet scrabbling, shoes squeaking on the floor as he tries to run.

_No you don't_, Hunter thinks.

He rolls over and tackles the guy.

"God, no! Please!" Mr. Fishy says. His hands claw at Hunter's head. They slip off the armor over his scalp and ears and dig into his face instead.

"Agh!" Hunter says. He rears back.

Mr. Fishy twists below him, starts to kick, starts to squirm away. Hunter grabs him again.

"No! Get off me!"

"Calm down!" Hunter says. "I'm _not_ gonna hurt you!"

"Please, _please no!_"

The man is somewhere in his thirties. He's got big arms. There should be no way for a scrawny teenager to hold him down. It takes Hunter two seconds to grab the guy's wrists and pin them to the floor.

Mr. Fishy starts to scream.

"No! Shh!" Hunter says. It does no good. The guy's eyes are crazy. He's thrashing around so much Hunter is worried he's going to hurt himself. "Quiet! I won't hurt you, I promise!"

Shit. He's totally losing it. He's shrieking like a wounded animal.

_Someone's going to hear this_.

Hunter switches both of the man's wrists to one hand and clamps his other over the guy's mouth. Mr. Fishy tries to bite him. His hand is made out of metal; Hunter barely feels it.

"Listen to me," he says. "_Look_ at me. I don't want to hurt you. But you need to shut up."

The screams get weaker; Mr. Fishy's too busy panting through his nose. Hunter keeps his hand over the guy's mouth. Eventually, the screams die down into whimpers and then stop altogether.

Hunter waits until his eyes lose the glazed look and says, "I'm gonna move my hand now, okay? But you start doing that again and it goes right back. Nod if you understand me."

Mr. Fishy nods enthusiastically. Hunter releases him, watching him as he pulls back. Mr. Fishy is too preoccupied with gulping air to try anything.

"You okay?" Hunter says.

Mr. Fishy nods.

"Where am I?" Hunter says.

"Sub-basement," Mr. Fishy says.

"Where is this place? What city?"

"Detroit. You're in Detroit."

"How do I know you're not lying?"

Mr. Fishy shakes his head. "No. Corner of… of Clark and West Fort. Right near the highway. You can look it up.

Hunter blinks. Forty seconds and a wifi-tap later and he confirms it.

_Huh. That's, like, four hours from the ship._

"Why are you telling me all this?" Hunter says.

Mr. Fishy looks at the second guy, crumpled in a heap behind the table. Hunter can hear the whistle as he breathes.

"Okay," Hunter says. "How do I get out of here?"

He's not expecting a reply. Maybe a, "Wouldn't you like to know?" or even a, "You'll never make it out alive." But Mr. Fishy goes and ruins it with, "Out the door, down the hall to the right. There's a set of stairs. Go to the first floor, take another right. There's a fire exit through the last room on the left."

Hunter stares.

It sounds easy. If he can manage not to run into anyone, he can be home free in a couple of minutes.

_I'm in the heart of Machination. This could be my one chance to find a way to bring them down. But then what? Who could possibly—_

His eyes widen.

_Oh god. I can't believe I'm gonna do this._

"Last question," he says. "There was another person with me, when they took me in. Where is he?"

* * *

><p>Seymour Simmons floats through space. It's dark. He's warm. Every time he exhales he feels hot moisture on his mouth and nose. It kind of smells like onions. His shoulder and face are a distant ache. If only it weren't so damned <em>hot<em>.

"Could you maybe turn that off now?" he says.

He can hear the goons moving around him, can smell sweat and aftershave and hair gel. They're feeling the heat, too. Those lamps can toast a small room like this fast. Simmons knows.

"So tell me again, Agent Simmons," Goon One says. He's the Talker, the needle guy, the one in charge.

"No, no, no," Simmons says. "I already told you, that's not my name."

"Please, Agent, if you'd just—"

"Agent? No. _No._ I've told you. If you'd just _listen_—"

"Cut the crap, Simmons," Goon Two says. Simmons's chair lurches as the goon grabs the arm rests. "We know who you are and we know who you work for. We just want to clarify some things."

Simmons sighs. More air trapped under the hood. When the hell did he eat onions, anyway?

"I _told_ you," he says.

"About the robots?" Goon One says.

"_Yes_, about the robots. I swear, I have no idea what they wanted. I mean, you guys got me out of there—big thumbs up, by the way—but you might want to rethink your tactics. That shit hurt like _hell_."

"Agent Simmons—"

"I'm not an Agent."

"—tell us about the ship."

"What ship?"

"The robots. We know they have a ship—"

"Really?"

"—and we think that's where they were taking you. After they kidnapped you."

"Who knows," Simmons says. "Didn't tell me anything. Just grabbed me—"

"So you've said. But I think you know more than you're telling us."

"Why would I do that? I like you guys. Well, not _like_ like you, but I owe you."

Silence. Sweat trickles down his back. He fidgets in the chair. He can't tell how long he's been in this damned room, marinating under the spotlight. He thinks it might be a while.

"Agent Simmons—"

"Are you guys stupid or something? I _told_ you—"

A shift in the air, a cool breeze.

"Who—"

"What the hell—"

A muffled grunt and a _thump!_ Simmons knows that sound: something hard hitting flesh. Then another, louder thump as something heavy—a body—hits the floor.

"Johnny! Grab—" Goon One says.

Too late. Simmons hears "Johnny" yelp, hears something crack and then a loud _bam!_ Johnny lets out a low groan and falls silent.

"Shit!" Goon One says. Rustling and then the familiar sound of a gun being un-holstered. "What the—ah!"

Noises, sounds of a scuffle. Goon One curses. His assailant makes no sound. Another hit and a clatter and a _whump_ as Goon One hits the table.

Seconds tick by. Or maybe it's minutes. Hard to tell. Cool fingers touch his throat, fumble with the edge of the hood. It slides up, over his head. Light slams into his eyes.

"Ah, _shit_," Simmons says and ducks his head.

He waits and blinks a few times, lets his eyes adjust before he looks up. The first thing he sees is metal pieces, plating and cables bunched together. A face moves into his vision. Dark helmet, coming down over the ears like some kind of high-tech astronaut cap. A human face, brown eyes, big nose. _Young_.

"Hey!" Simmons says. "Kid! What are you doing here?"

The kid blinks at him and draws back.

"Simmons?" he says.

"Yeah."

The kid makes a face at him.

"What? Something wrong?" Simmons says.

"You look like crap."

Simmons looks down. His arms are cuffed to the chair, his shirt is rumpled and sweat-stained, his face feels all puffy.

"Yeah, well," he says. "What brings you down here?"

* * *

><p>"You know this is stupid, right?" Simmons says.<p>

"_Yes_," Hunter says. "And like I told you the last three times, I _need_ to get another body. Or do you want to try to catch a bus when we get out of here? Because I don't think they'll let me on."

"I'm just saying. We should get out now, before someone realizes we aren't where we should be. Do you even know where you're going?"

_Vaguely_, Hunter thinks. Mr. Fishy's information had been good. It had led Hunter right to Simmons. When asked if they had any more Headmaster bodies, he'd gotten all flustered, started babbling something about a hanger on the other side of the building. Which is turning out to be huge.

Hunter peeks around the corner. The next hallway is empty. He turns to tell Simmons that only to find a gun in his face.

"Jesus," he says. "Would you watch where you point that thing?"

Simmons rolls his eyes. "It's not aimed at _you_, kid."

"It's close enough."

The Agent makes a noncommittal grunt, the guns shifts so Hunter's not staring down the barrel.

Hunter slips into the hall. He's gone about six feet when he realizes he doesn't hear Simmons behind him. He turns. The man stands where he left him, back to the wall, gun up. He's bruised up, banged up, and his clothes look like he's been wearing them for three days. Despite all this, he seems happy.

_At least one of us is having a good time_, Hunter thinks.

"Come on, Simmons," he says.

The man glances over and makes a shushing motion. He's staring back the way they came.

"What?" Hunter says.

"You hear that?" Simmons says.

"Hear what?"

Even as he says it, he catches the small chirp.

_What is that?_

The visor shows nothing. Simmons shifts the gun and brings it down to eye-level, arms out. They wait. Seconds later, the sound comes again, louder this time.

"Is that—" Hunter says.

"Radio," Simmons says.

"_Shit_."

Someone is coming toward them and he's not showing up on Hunter's scanners.

"Run," he says.

He doesn't need to; Simmons belts past him and Hunter turns to follow. He can hear footsteps if he concentrates, thick soles, boots of some kind.

_Crap, crap, crap!_

The hallway branches off up ahead. They're running in blind and with no cover.

"Door!" Simmons says.

Hunter spots it: to the right, up ahead.

"—ection 13, say again?" the man with the radio says.

Simmons reaches the door first. He slams into it and fumbles for the handle. It twists. He practically falls in, Hunter right behind him. Simmons whirls. He shuts the door with a soft click.

The only light in the room is the blue glow of his visor. He presses himself against the wall and listens to Simmons breathing. Outside, the radio squawks. The man mumbles something back. He's right outside the door. Footsteps stop. Simmons tenses up.

_Wait for it_, he thinks. Two seconds. Three. He can end it fast, punch through the wall and grab the guy. The only problem is the radio. If he manages to—

The footsteps continue. Hunter sags against the wall.

"Whew," Simmons says. "That was fun."

"Uh huh."

"Alright, he should be gone in a minute or two. We can…"

But Hunter isn't listening. Simmons voice echoes. Hunter looks into the darkness, he listens to the way the sound bounces off walls, distant ones.

_Huh?_

He walks further in. The glow of the visor doesn't reach anything.

"Hey, Simmons, do you see a light switch anywhere?"

"Why? I thought you were all gung-ho to—"

"Just… just turn on the lights, will you?"

Clothing rustles. The switch clicks on. The room is flooded with light and Hunter has to shield his eyes. Behind him, Simmons lets out a low whistle. Hunter looks up and feels his brain stop working.

The room isn't big, it's _enormous_. Three stories high, maybe more. On the far wall is what looks like a giant garage door with a ramp leading up from the pit below them. They're standing on a balcony over it. Hunter latches onto the railing to steady himself.

"Oh my god," he says.

The entire floor is filled with rows and rows of cars, in blue and silver and yellow. All of them identical, all of them Lamborghinis. They're all empty Headmaster units.

"This," Hunter says. "They're building an _army_."

* * *

><p>lildevchick and Starfire201, you two continue to rock. And tsukyasha! I've got another reviewer! (This deserves booze!) KayDeeBlu continues to keep me from getting too wordy and for that, thank you.<p>

Next chapter: Do You Have a Plan


	12. Do You Have a Plan

**Chapter Twelve: Do You Have a Plan**

"This… they're building an army," the kid says.

_This_ cuts through the haze in Simmons's brain. He frowns and looks over the parking garage.

"Come again?" he says.

The kid pulls back from the railing and Simmons can see that his face has gone pale.

"They're Headmaster units, bodies. Machination is building an army of these."

Agent Seymour Simmons has seen a lot of nasty stuff during his career, things buried so deep in "classified" that American Presidents never catch wind of them, things that, if ever made public, could potentially break civilization itself. And yet, standing on that balcony, looking out over at what must be fifty robot bodies, bodies that can generate their own weaponry, bodies that can rip through a building, his guts twist up.

"Why?" he says. "What's this for?"

The kid shakes his head. "I have no idea."

"Oh come on. They made you into one of them. You gotta know _something_."

"Yeah, Simmons, they did. And they didn't ask for my permission first. So what makes you think they would have told me anything?"

"But you were here, right? You had to have overheard something."

"Oh please. No one stood around talking about their schemes for world domination. I barely saw anyone. I…"

Simmons, who has been counting the cars, stops on number forty-three to find the kid standing there, his eyebrows drawn together. His pupils have shrunk. A second later he blinks and shakes his head and everything is back to normal.

"Kid?"

"I… I was drugged. I think… they brought me somewhere before, before they did this,_" _he says and looks down at himself. "There was someone there. Something hanging from the ceiling. They—god." His gaze meets Simmons. "There's another Transformer. It's one of them behind this."

"A what?" Simmons says.

"One of the robots. An NBE?"

"Hold on a minute, back up. You're _sure_."

Hunter nods.

"But why? Why go through all the trouble of building places like this and doing, _that_," he waves a hand at the kid, "to humans? You'd think they could come up with a better way to recruit people. NBE's. Whatever."

"I don't think it's the Decepticons," the kid says. He's gazing at something in the distance, something only he can see. "There are two factions: Autobots and Decepticons. They're in the middle of a civil war or something."

Simmons files that bit of information away.

"But the one I saw, he wasn't a Decepticon. I don't think he was, anyway. Maybe he's some kind of rogue?"

Simmons is only half-listening. There's a ramp at the far end of the room, leading up to a set of doors, probably to the outside. No one to stop them. They can nab one of these bodies, get to a phone. He can have every single agent of his division on site within eight hours.

"—can't leave this here," the kid says. "We've gotta destroy it."

_What._

"Excuse me?" he says.

Hunter turns to him. Simmons does not like the determined gleam in his eyes.

"We've gotta destroy this," he says.

"Oh, I don't think so."

"Well I do." The kid starts down a flight of stairs, into the Headmaster pit. Simmons grabs his arm and spins him back. Hunter rips himself free and glares. "Simmons, now is not the time for—"

He shuts up when Simmons draws his gun.

"What are you doing?"

"Take a step back," Simmons says.

"Are you out of your mind?"

"Not entirely. Step back."

It's the hotel room all over again. The kid wants to lunge for it. Simmons can see it in the way he holds himself. He's glancing from Simmons's face to the gun. He's calculating the odds. And once again, he doesn't like what he finds. He steps back.

"You have got to be the biggest dick I've ever met," he says.

"I'll take that as a compliment. Turn around and put both hands on the rail."

And once again, Simmons finds himself holding someone at gunpoint with no way of securing them.

"So what is it with you?" the kid says. "Is this some kind of power trip? Do you just like pointing guns at people who can't defend themselves?"

"You hardly qualify for that," Simmons says.

Hunter ignores the barb. "You really do work for Machination, don't you? This whole thing was a set-up. The interrogation, that guy in the hall, it was a ruse, wasn't it?"

"You're _still_ going on about that? They shot me the same as you with that shock bomb."

"Only because you were in the way. Got caught in the crossfire, didn't you, Simmons? Traitor."

"What did you say?"

"That's what you are, isn't it?"

"You have no idea what you're talking about, son. Shut up before my finger slips and I put a hole through your skull."

He's shaking. He's actually _shaking._ Some upstart punk has managed to get to him. Simmons takes a deep breath and lets it out through his nose.

"Oh, yeah," the kid says. "No problem. Should I wait here while you pop out into the hall to let your friends know where you are?"

God, it would be so easy to pull the trigger.

_I need the little bastard to get out_, he thinks.

"If I really wanted to catch you, don't you think I'd have done it before now?" Simmons says. The kid has no answer. "No. I'd have taken you out the second you turned your back. I wouldn't have let you drag me through the guts of the building all the way over here, listening to your whining."

"Then why the hell are you doing this?"

"Because I'm aware of the bigger picture."

"What bigger picture? Machination built an army. You really think they're gonna use it for _anything_ helpful? We've got to get rid of it. Now."

"That's not your decision to make, young man."

"God! What's your plan, then? _Leave_ it here? Wait for—" he stops, turns to stare. "You want to use them."

"Put your hands back on that rail."

But Hunter isn't listening anymore.

"You actually think you can use them? How? Sunstreaker," he hesitates. His brows furrow. For one moment, he looks troubled. Then it's gone. "You're never gonna get it to work."

"You seem to work just fine," Simmons says.

"That's different."

"Really? Enlighten me."

"To make _us_," he says the word like a curse, "they had to wire us into a Transformer. We were part of him. We had access to his, his mind. I could hear him all the time. But then, a week ago, I woke up and he was gone. I don't know if Machination did something or if… if something happened to him. Either way, it won't work again."

"So we find another one. We use this facility to—"

"You don't get it, do you? What they did to him, what they did to us, it's _wrong_."

Simmons snorts. The kid's fists are curled, his jaw clenched: the poster image of moral outrage.

"Always the morality pet, aren't you?" he says.

"That has nothing to do with this. We were in his mind, Simmons. It hurt him. You can't do that, not to anyone else."

"I can. And I will."

The kid's glare is almost hot enough to melt steel.

"I don't know how much your 'friends' let you in on," Simmons says, "but these things have been here for _years_, kid. Always keeping out of sight, lurking in the shadows, until a few weeks ago. All of the sudden global activity jumped. They came out into the open, in Brasnya, in some kind of giant robot shoot-out. Civilians got hurt. We, the people I work for, think it's the precursor to an invasion. Know anything about that?"

The kid just stares.

"We can use this against them," Simmons says. "Take their army and use it to defend ourselves. If that means making a few of these things _uncomfortable_, it's a price I'm willing to pay."

"It's not an invasion. The Autobots—"

"That what Red was? Sideswipe? Was he one of these Autobots? Because I noticed he ditched you pretty quick. Not very reliable, are they?"

"This is _torture_."

"And?"

"So say you do, say you capture a Decepticon or something, you use him like that. Say you even win. What does that make you?"

"Oh grow up," Simmons says. "Human history is nothing but one group of people trying to screw over another group of people. You do whatever it takes to make sure your group is the one that comes out ahead or you die."

The kid's not looking at Simmons anymore, just focusing on the Headmaster units.

"You can always blame it on me, all right?" Simmons says.

"No."

"What?"

"I said no," Hunter says.

"Listen, this isn't a philosophical debate. I am not going to risk the future of the entire human race to make your conscience feel better. Step back to the rail. I'm going to count to three."

"And then what?"

"And then I'm going to shoot you."

"Go ahead. You'll bring down every guard right on top of you."

"At least I'll get to take you out first."

"I thought you were counting."

"_One_," Simmons says.

The kid doesn't move. He watches Simmons, his face blank.

"Two."

Still no reaction.

"Come on. Don't be an idiot." But Hunter doesn't so much as twitch. Simmons readjusts his grip and wishes he could wipe his palms. "This is ridiculous."

"You're the one with the gun," Hunter says.

"Do not tempt me."

"What's wrong, Simmons? Change of heart? Assuming you have one, of course."

"Hands on the rail."

"No."

"Fine. You wanna be a martyr? Go right ahead. Thr—"

He doesn't see it. One moment the kid is standing there. The next, pain erupts beneath Simmons's right eye and his head snaps back. He doesn't fall so much as crumple. The next thing he knows, Hunter's robotic foot steps into view.

Simmons shakes his head.

"You just assaulted a federal officer," he says. It comes out slurred.

"So arrest me."

He pushes up into a sprawl. The kid picks up the gun. He starts to walk to the stairs.

"Do not go down there," Simmons says.

The kid ignores him.

"Stop right there."

"Make me," Hunter says.

_Great_, Simmons thinks. _**Now**__ he grows a pair._

* * *

><p>Hunter's legs don't want to work. He can hear Simmons getting to his feet and he's glad he's turned away because he knows the expression on his face would be a dead giveaway.<p>

_Jesus Christ, I almost died._

He clutches the railing as he climbs down the stairs. He's still shaking.

"Hey!" Simmons says.

_Ignore him. Don't look. Keep moving._ It's hard enough trying to get his wobbling legs to stay straight. One slip and he'll go tumbling right down the stairs and mechanical body or no, it'll hurt. _Just ignore him._

"Kid, wait up."

_Oh, goddamnit._

He stops, turns, spots Simmons trotting after him. His cheek is swelling up. Hunter can't find it in him to care.

"What do you want?" he says.

"Just hold on a second."

Hunter sighs. "It's no use, Simmons. You're not gonna stop me."

Simmons makes a strange waving motion with his hand. He's only a few steps above Hunter and he's not slowing down. Hunter tenses. If the man leaps at him, tries to tackle him… but then Simmons continues on, past Hunter.

_Huh?_

Simmons looks back. "You coming?"

"What the hell are you trying to do, now?"

Simmons stops. "Go downstairs."

"_Why_? You were all ready to shoot me a second ago."

"Eh." He flutters his hand again.

"'Eh?'"

"_Eh_. I changed my mind," Simmons says.

Hunter stares. "You…"

"Listen, kid, the longer you stand there trying to catch flies in your mouth, the more likely it is that someone is gonna notice we're gone, alright? I'd really like to get a move on before that happens. Now, you said you want to get rid of these things. Do you have a plan or were you just thinking out loud? Again."

"Um," Hunter says. "Sort of."

"'Sort of'?" Simmons says. He raises his eyebrows. Then he lets out a bark of laughter and shakes his head. "You would have taken a bullet for 'sort of?'"

"I was going to blow them up, okay?" he says. Simmons sniffs. Then he nods. Hunter takes that as a sign to continue. "Those bodies are fueled by energon. Sideswipe said it was too volatile to 'orbital jump,' so I thought maybe it'll burn."

"Okay. So it burns. Then what?"

"So… we slosh it everywhere and set the building on fire, too."

Simmons cocks his head. "You're planning on using the robot fuel to burn the place down?"

"Yeah?"

Now it's Simmons's turn to stare.

"You're trying to burn the place down with a fire you set here, on the edge of the building?"

_Why does it sound wrong when he says it?_

"You have no idea what you're doing, do you?" Simmons says. "You want to start a bonfire you start at the bottom, son. Lowest level, as close to the center as you can get, for a place this big. You want it to burn _really_ quick you put it in multiple locations and make sure it has plenty of ventilation."

He says it so calmly, like explaining how to drive a car or connect to a wireless modem. But this is arson. And Simmons is standing there watching him with an amused glint in his eyes.

"Where the hell do you learn this stuff?" Hunter says.

Simmons shrugs. "By the time you get to be my age, you pick up a few things."

He starts down the stairs again.

"Why are you helping me now?" Hunter says.

Simmons takes the last few steps down to the ground. He inhales, pauses like he's going to start talking, and sighs.

"In all likelihood," he says, "the chances of me getting out and getting a team back here before this 'Machination' notices are nil. I'll bet that they can have this entire facility stripped and gutted by morning. Since I can't take any of it with me…"

"You're not gonna let them have it, either," Hunter finishes for him.

Simmons shrugs.

Hunter watches him for a few seconds and shakes his head. Then he goes after him. When he reaches him, he holds the gun out.

"Fine," he says. "But you try to waffle on me and I'll put you through a wall."

Simmons takes the gun and slides it back into the holster on his belt. "I'd like to see you try, kid."

Hunter rolls his eyes. He's standing next to one of the Lamborghinis. He places a hand on the side.

"I think I can activate it," he says. "But someone's going to notice if I walk one of these down the hall."

Simmons scratches his nose. He looks around the garage and hums. Then he snaps his fingers and when he turns to Hunter, he's grinning.

"You won't have to," Simmons says. "They gotta store that stuff somewhere, right?"

* * *

><p>Jason Morgan follows the scent of brewing coffee into the break room. He sticks his head in and finds the room empty.<p>

_Awesome_, he thinks.

The cabinets are stocked with mugs. He grabs a chipped one with little Christmas trees on it, and pours himself a cup. He leans over to the refrigerator, opens the door, and rummages for the creamer. When he finds it, he straightens. He starts to set it on the counter.

Movement out of the corner of his eye; Jason glances over. And freezes.

A man stands behind him. He looks awful: his clothes—slacks and a sweat-stained, button-up shirt—are rumpled. His right cheek is purple, matching the bruises under both his eyes. And he's wearing the biggest, creepiest shit-eating grin Jason has ever seen.

"How you doing?" the man says.

"Uh, can I… help you?" Jason says.

"As a matter of fact, I think you can."

Jason backs away. "Listen, I don't know who you are or how you got in here, but—"

"Whoa now. Calm down, son."

_Son?_

"I don't want any trouble," Jason says.

Jason's hip brushes one of the tables. The man lifts his hands in a placating gesture; Jason notices that he winces.

"That's cool," the man says. "I just wanna ask you—"

The man lunges. Jason yelps and leaps back. He tips over a chair. It tangles with his legs and he starts to fall. Something latches onto the back of his shirt collar. Jason is hauled up, spun around, and an arm wraps around his neck.

"Ah! No! Help! Someone—_urk_!"

The arm squeezes. Jason reaches up, tries to pry himself loose, when the psycho starts to drag him across the room. It's all Jason can do to keep himself from tripping. Then they're passing through the door, out into the hall.

_I'm gonna die!_ he thinks. _This guy's going to kill me!_

Another sound, a rattle and a click and he's dragged into a dark room. The door shuts with the finality of a tomb. The arm lets go and Jason is shoved, stumbling, against a file cabinet. Hands pat along his frame, dig into his pocket, pull out his wallet and cell phone and a lighter.

He's in some kind of store room. The lights are off but it's not completely dark. There's a blue glow—

Jason tries to gasp and almost swallows his tongue.

It's… it's a Headmaster. There's a rogue Headmaster standing next to the door with its visor lit up.

"Oh," Jason says. It comes out a moan.

He spun back around to find the psycho right there.

"I think he recognizes you," the man says. It takes a moment for Jason to realize he's talking to the rogue.

"Yeah," the rogue says. It shifts on its feet. The small part of Jason's brain that isn't gibbering in terror registers how nervous it looks.

_I'm gonna die. Oh god, I'm gonna die._

"Hey."

Fingers snap under his nose. Jason looks away. The psycho is standing there. Jason's brain latches on to something familiar, something he can deal with.

"Look at me," the psycho says. "There you go. What's your name?"

It takes a few tries before his mouth will work. "Jason."

The man nods. "Okay, Jason. I've got a few questions for you."

Jason nods.

"You obviously know what he is," the psycho says, gesturing to the rogue. "Do you know about their fuel? Where they keep it?"

The man is talking to him. He knows that. But the words don't make sense. His mind comes up blank. He can't look away from the hulking machine next to the door.

"You know what?" the man says to the Headmaster. "You're not helping. Just… go stand in the corner or something."

The Headmaster's mouth opens. Then closes. It moves behind Jason. He tries to follow it, keep an eye on it, but then the psycho grabs his face and turns his head away.

"Alright, Jason, was it? Look at me. Do you know where the energon is?"

His mouth is too dry. No words form. Jason nods.

"Okay. You're doing a good job. Do you keep it somewhere in this facility?"

Nod.

"Where? No, look at _me_, Jason. Don't worry about him. He's not gonna move. Where do you keep the energon?"

"S-storage room," Jason says.

"Which one?" the man says.

"SL-3. Room… room…" the man keeps staring at him while Jason struggles to remember.

"Room thirty-nine. I think."

"Okay, and by SL-3 you mean sub-level? As in the third one? This one?"

It's so much easier to nod than talk.

"Convenient," the Headmaster says.

The psycho shrugs. Jason is having a hard time staying upright. His legs have turned to water. One shift, one step, and he'll collapse. The man studies him.

"Why are you so scared?" he says.

_Don't look, don't look!_

"Because of what it can do," Jason says, eyes darting to the side, to where he knows the rogue must be. "Because of what it did."

The man raises an eyebrow. "Who, the kid? What'd he do?"

"_Simmons_," the Headmaster says.

"Tell me, Jason."

"This isn't necessary. Let's just—"

"Jason."

Fingers snaps again.

"He… he killed Sanderson," Jason says. "He hit him. Through a wall."

The psycho blinks. He turns his head and looks over Jason.

Silence.

The man half snorts, half laughs. He looks back to Jason, grinning, and says, "No shit?"

Jason shakes his head.

"Wow," the man says. To the rogue, "You weren't joking."

"You are such an asshole," the rogue says.

The man wipes his eyes, sighs, and suddenly turns dead serious. "You're sure about the energon, Jason?"

Jason performs a mental double-take. Then, "Uh, yeah. Yeah."

"Okay then."

The man steps back. Jason is free to move again only his body seems unable to. The man jerks his thumb toward the Headmaster. Jason looks over, catches a glimpse of the thing's face beneath that glowing visor. It's got a puzzled frown on its face. Its eyes widen.

Pain beneath Jason's right ear. His vision goes white.

* * *

><p>Hunter winces as the guy hits the carpet. Simmons slips the gun back into its holster.<p>

"Geez," Hunter says. "Excessive force, much?"

"It's not easy to knock someone out," Simmons says. He kneels down and presses his fingers into Jason's neck. He looks up at Hunter. "Well, maybe for _you_ it is, but I gotta work with what I've got."

"Pistol whipping? He's not dead, is he?"

Simmons is shaking his head before Hunter can finish the sentence. "Nah. He'll have a concussion. Probably. Nothing serious."

"Oh yeah. Concussion. That's not serious at all."

Simmons sighs. "Are you going to stand there and get all snippy or are you gonna get over here help me tie him?"

Hunter shoves his irritation down. He pushes away from the wall.

"Good," Simmons says. "Now get the laces off his shoes."

Five minutes later, they slip out into the deserted hallway. They're at room number fifty-four. He can see fifty-three further down the hall.

"This is really starting to bug me," Hunter says. "Where _is_ everyone?"

"This isn't normal?" Simmons says.

"No. Last time, when I broke out of the place in Tampa, there were people everywhere. I dunno, I just thought maybe they'd be smarter this time around, have guards or something."

"Maybe something happened," Simmons say. "Maybe they got called away."

Something nags in the back of Hunter's mind. Something he can't quite remember.

"Something wrong?" Simmons says.

Hunter shakes his head. "No. It's… no. Let's go."

They reach an intersection and it takes another minute and more bickering before they turn left.

_Forty-two. Forty-one. Forty._

A vast stretch of blank wall leading up to a corner.

"I think it's up there," Hunter says.

It is. Simmons slips around the corner, hugging the wall, gun drawn. Hunter tries the door. It's locked. He takes a step back and then kicks it. Metal dents, the frame warps, and it bursts open. Inside, the room is dark, but he can make out shapes, large squares stacked against the wall.

"Sorry," he says. "I know that was loud."

But Simmons isn't listening. He's not even looking at him. He's staring toward the other corner, eyes fixed on something behind Hunter. Hunter turns. Standing fifteen feet away is a man in body armor. One of his is hands empty. The other clutches a radio.

* * *

><p>Sorry it's late! I was so busy freaking out over a mid-term that I completely forgot to post this.<p>

Next chapter: Fire in the Hole


	13. Fire in the Hole

**Chapter Thirteen: Fire in the Hole**

For ten seconds, no one moves. Simmons is a dark shape out of the corner of Hunter's eye. The guard seems to have forgotten how to breathe. Hunter eyeballs the radio; the man's thumb is a centimeter away from the "talk" button. It'll take him a second to hit that button and scream. Hunter can reach the guy in half that time. Maybe. Probably.

Or Simmons can shoot him.

"You make one move, pal, and I fire," Simmons says.

But there's a problem with that: the noise. The guard seems to realize this the moment Hunter does. He ducks to his left and disappears behind the corner.

"Section twenty-three! Breach! Breach!" he says.

Hunter starts to go after him. Simmons grabs his shoulder and whips him back around.

"Too late," Simmons says. "We need to move."

Hunter swears. He turns back to the room.

"We're gonna have to split up," Simmons says. "Each one takes some of that stuff, spreads it, and lights it. Any idea how long it'll take for more of those bastards to show up?"

"No," Hunter says.

"We'll play it by ear, then."

The room is tall, extending up into the next sub-basement. He can make out the dim shape of some kind of open elevator platform against the far wall. Hunter spots a light switch and flips it. He groans.

The walls are lined with stacks of sealed boxes made out of some sort of dark, non-reflective metal. That's not the problem. The problem is that each box is five feet tall.

"Oh you've gotta be kidding me," Simmons says.

Hunter walks over to the nearest cube and raps on it with his knuckles. It makes a dull thump. He can see no latches, no labels, no nothing.

"The hell do you open this?" Simmons says, somewhere behind him.

He prods the top. It bends. Hunter flexes his fingers and then jabs down. The metal gives easily and he punches clear through, up to the wrist. He pulls his hand back out and it's covered in a shimmery, pink liquid. It's got a weird, tangy smell.

This is what had seeped out of his robotic arm when Sideswipe had smashed it, this is what Hunter had seen running down the 'bot's leg after he was shot.

"It's energon," Hunter says.

He nudges the cube. It scrapes across the floor maybe six inches. He could lift one end, no problem. But it's too big for him to lift alone and between Simmons's screwed up shoulder and the fact that he doesn't have a cyborg body, he's useless.

"Shit," he says.

He could push it down the hall. But there's only one of him; they don't have time.

"Hey, Simmons," he says, "do we _need_ to put this stuff in a lot of places?"

Simmons looks around the room. His eyes stop at the elevator and then crawl up the wall to the set of doors that must open into the sub-basement above them.

"It all depends on how volatile this stuff is," he says. "If we can get those doors open, spread it up to the next floor, it'll help."

Out in the hall, Hunter catches the sound of boots running. A lot of them.

"Good," he says. "'Cause we've gotta do it, like, _now_."

Simmons squints at the elevator. He mutters something to himself.

They have to barricade the door. One cube won't be heavy enough by itself. But two of them...

At the wall, the cubes are stacked four-high. They stairway down toward to the center of the room, one pile on each side, like gymnasium bleachers. Hunter leans down and hooks his fingers around the edges of a stack of two. His body strains. His legs actually groan. Energon sloshes inside the cubes.

"Simmons," he says, "need your help over here."

Hunter drags the cubes away from the rest of them. Simmons steps behind it.

"On three," Simmons says.

He pushes. Hunter pulls. The cubes grate over the floor. The noise in the hallway gets worse, all pounding feet and running legs and equipment jostling.

Hunter's back hits the door frame. He stops and goes around to the other side and helps Simmons push it the last few inches to nestle it up against the door.

"Damn," Simmons says, straightening up. He rubs his left shoulder. "Heavy, ain't they?"

Hunter counts at least fifty of the things in there, almost evenly divided, one staircase on the right, one on the left. He stops at the one on the right. The metal is too think to punch through on the sides. Only on the top is it thin enough.

_Thick walls, thin lid_, he thinks. _They're giant, flammable pudding cups._

He eyeballs the first tier. Hunter hauls himself onto the cube.

"What are you doing?" Simmons says.

The top bends under his weight, but it doesn't break. He stands on shaking limbs, half expecting to take an impromptu energon bath. It never happens; he wobbles a bit and steadies himself on the next cube.

He leans down and plunges his hand through the top. He shakes the energon off his fingers, leans back, and kicks the thing over. Thick, viscous liquid pours out, chugging like an overturned milk carton. He steps over to the next one and repeats the process. Energon begins to pool around the base of the stacks.

"Oh," Simmons says.

"Get over to the elevator and see if it works," Hunter says. He looks over to the other wall and frowns.

_We need to get all of it to burn. But they must have some sort of safeguard, some kind of security measures or something._

The cubes have a weird texture, almost waxy.

_Flame resistant?_

The stuff puddling together on the floor would burn well enough, but they need a _firestorm_. A small lake won't do it. He needs to get as many of these things open as he can. He scrambles back down the line, punching holes in the next tier up. He catches a glimpse of Simmons struggling to push one over to the elevator, his shoes slipping in the mess on the floor.

A noise outside. Something bangs against the door. Hunter and Simmons freeze. They look at each other. Simmons lunges at his cube, pushing it the final few feet. Hunter moves double-time, his feet sliding beneath him as he backtracks.

He's got maybe half of them open when a man says, "We know you're in there. We have the area surrounded. Surrender now, before this gets ugly."

Hunter rolls his eyes. Simmons laughs. Neither of them says anything. The door bangs again. Their barricade holds.

"We're getting in there, one way or another," the man outside says.

Hunter's halfway down the second tier. He isn't even bothering to shake his hand off anymore.

"I'm giving you until the count of ten," the man says. "One."

Simmons curses low and harsh. Hunter doesn't look up to see why, he just keeps going.

"Two."

This entire side is coated. The puddle on the floor is an inch deep.

"Three."

He doesn't have more time. He hops off the last cube and sloshes over to the elevator.

"Four."

"Think they'll use explosives?" Hunter says.

"Five."

"Doubt it," Simmons says.

"Six."

Simmons hunches over the controls. It's a gray box with two buttons on it. He pushes the top one.

"Seven."

The elevator begins to rise. Hunter expects a grinding or whining, but it just glides up, off the floor with a soft whir.

"Eight."

Four feet up—ten—fifteen—they're level with the top of the stack.

"Nine."

Up past the ceiling of sub-basement three. Only ten feet left to the doors. Eight. Six.

"Ten."

Another bang, this one sharper. The stack of cubes against the door rattles.

"They're gonna batter it down," Simmons says. They're at the elevator doors for sub-basement two. There's a button on the wall. Simmons lifts a hand to it and pauses. "You might want to get out of the way."

Hunter nods and slips to one side.

"Opening… now."

The doors slide apart—

Wide eyes behind goggles. Then Hunter is out and into the hallway, slamming into the guard and knocking him down. He lands on top of him in a forest of legs. He grabs the nearest one and yanks. A man topples. He kicks another one. Something snaps. The man screams.

A flash and a loud _boom!_ He looks up into the barrel of a gun. Then Simmons is there. He shoots the guard in the leg. The man lands on Hunter.

Hunter reaches, trying to grab a weapon, any weapon. One of the guards twists around. His elbow lands in Hunter's face. Hunter sees stars. Then his fingers close on something cold and hard. He rips it away and takes a swing. The man's head snaps back, his helmet flops. Hunter kicks free and scrambles to his feet.

Time freezes. Simmons stands near the door. At his feet is one of the guards, hands wrapped around his thigh. Blood smears the floor beneath him. His lips are pulled back. He moans through his teeth.

Three others lie in a pile next to him. Two of them are moving, one is not. The four remaining guards have their weapons up, pointed at the two of them. No one moves.

"Put your weapons down," Simmons says.

The standoff continues for two seconds. One of the guards suddenly eases a hand off his gun and raises them both into the air. He crouches, slowly, the rest following suit, and places the weapon on the floor. He eases back up.

"Get your wounded and get out of here," Simmons says. "And if I were you, I'd do it fast."

The lead guard nods. He turns and makes a whirling motion with one hand. Two of the others bend down. One of them pulls off his glove and presses his fingers into the unmoving guard's throat. He looks up and nods. The two of them start to heft the unconscious man up. The lead guard kneels next to the guy with the shot leg.

"Come on, Porter," he says. "Up."

He has to drag the guy to his feet. The third one is hoisted onto the shoulders of the last guard. His left shin flops.

Simmons watches them go. Only after they duck around a corner does he lower his gun.

A huge clatter and banging down in the room. The other group has broken through the barricade.

Simmons gives a half smile.

"Not bad," he says.

"Yeah," Hunter says. The man's leg had dangled—limp, obviously broken. And he'd done it. He hadn't even thought about it, he'd just _done_ it.

Simmons sheds his outer shirt, stripping down to a white tank-top.

"What are you doing?" Hunter says.

Simmons rips the sleeve off. He wads it up. Then he crooks a finger at Hunter and points to the cube on the elevator. "Pop the top."

Simmons stuffs one end of his shirt through the hole.

"A Molotov Cocktail," Hunter says.

"Yep," Simmons says. "We need some kind of fuse. I don't want to be around when it goes off."

Voices from below. Someone shouts, "Get that elevator secured!"

Simmons pulls a lighter out of his pocket.

"Get ready to run," he says.

Hunter glances into the room. He can imagine other guards down there, stepping through the energon. They have no idea what's coming.

"We should warn them," he says.

Simmons gives him a look.

"What?" Hunter says. "You let those other guys go."

"Eh."

Simmons flicks the lighter. He holds it to the shirt. They wait. The flame flickers. Cloth blackens.

"Come on," Simmons says.

"I've got it!" a voice from the level down.

The shirt crinkles around the edges and turns black. A flame springs up. Simmons flashes Hunter a grin.

"You really like this kind of stuff, don't you?" Hunter says.

Simmons turns, cups his hands around his mouth, and shouts, "Fire in the hole!"

He slams the lower button on the control box.

"Go! Go!" he says.

Hunter is already running. Behind him, the lift hums. He can picture is sinking towards the ground, flame spreading, the energon reflecting the glow. They sprint down the hall, past more doors. He sees no one else.

_God, I hope they're evacuating_, he thinks.

Simmons is panting. Despite the manic look on his face, he's pale and sweating.

"I can carry you," Hunter says.

"Not a chance."

The hallway stretches on. They're heading back toward the hangar, back toward the Headmaster bodies.

Simmons grimaces. He reaches up, grabs at his left shoulder. This time, Hunter doesn't give him a choice. He stops. Before he can really think about it, about how stupid this is, he scoops Simmons up into his arms.

"What the hell!" the man says.

"Just shut up and hold on!"

_I can't believe I'm doing this. I can't freaking believe I'm doing this._

"Put me _down_, kid."

He doesn't bother with an answer.

"I'm serious. I will shoot you, I swear to god."

"Simmons, now isn't—"

A flash. The hallway turns white. Something slams into his back. The world tilts. His feet leave the ground and he's picked up, screaming, and thrown through the air.

* * *

><p>Dr. Paul Berkman's first clue that something is wrong is when Mr. Dante, still in his Headmaster unit, straightens.<p>

"Excuse me, gentlemen," he says and steps away from the operating table. He turns away. The orange visor over his robotic eyes blips. He's speaking with someone.

Dr. Berkman looks away.

They're almost through the final shell of the robot, what Mr. Dante refers to as the "proto-form." Once through that—the thickest, strongest layer—they'll be inside the chest cavity. He estimates that they have fifteen, maybe twenty minutes to go.

It takes two lab technicians to handle the laser cutter, what the staff has nicknamed the "lightsaber." So close to the fuel source and they don't want to risk damaging anything by using a bladed saw. Two other technicians stand on the table, one to monitor the robot's output, the other to monitor the laser cutter. The four guards in the room form a loose perimeter around them all. They're all armed.

_Bad enough having Mr. Dante lurking around in that unit_, he thinks, _now I have to work with guns pointed at me._

Mr. Dante had, of course, said they were necessary. And while this particular specimen had been a handful, like the other, once they were this deep into it, it had gone quiet and still. A sort of shock reflex, Dr. Berkman speculates. Which makes the guards and the guns _un_necessary.

The red robot hasn't moved for twenty minutes. Hasn't made a sound. From here on out, Dr. Berkman doesn't it expect to.

The edges of the incision glow a hot yellow, cooling to a deeper red up near the top. He has a cart standing by, ready to take the fuel source once it's been extracted.

Dr. Berkman looks at his watch.

An immense clap of thunder. The lights flicker. Dr. Berkman feels some sort of shockwave ripple through the room. The walls sway. The floor shakes and he clutches the railing to keep on his feet.

_An earthquake?_ he thinks.

People shout. One of the technicians slips off the table. A lightsaber operator starts to go after him.

"No!" Dr. Berkman says. "Turn it off! Get the laser cutter off!"

_These aren't tremors_, he thinks. _If it were an earthquake, we'd still hear it, it would be moving differently by now._

But there's no roaring, none of the noise of an earthquake. The movement is all wrong; the building is trembling, not rocking back and forth, not rolling like a boat on the waves. It's as if something large has smacked into them.

_Did an airplane crash?_

The hum of the laser cutter cuts off. Dr. Berkman turns to Mr. Dante and opens his mouth to say something until he catches sight of his face. His stomach drops out.

"Dr. Berkman," Mr. Dante says. "We must excuse ourselves. If you would be good enough to finish up here? Pack this up and get ready for immediate transport."

"But… _now_?" Dr. Berkman says. "I don't know if we can—"

Mr. Dante looks at him and Dr. Berkman's protest dies in his throat.

"We realize how unusual this is, but we really must begin evacuation. Now."

Dr. Berkman nods. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see his technicians staring.

"Of course," he says.

Mr. Dante ducks out of the room. Dr. Berkman watches him go. He swallows a few times. The building shakes. The railing beneath his hands trembles. Something has happened. The guards talk in low voices. His technicians aren't even trying to hide their eavesdropping.

Dr. Berkman clears his throat. Two of his people stop whispering and look to him. The others ignore him completely.

"People," he says. His voice cracks. He clears his throat again and, louder, he says, "People. You heard him. We have a job to do, so let's do it. And someone make sure Berenson hasn't hurt himself."

One of the guards shuffles over to where the technician fell off the table. The rest get moving. The laser cutter hums to life. One of the guards presses his fingers to his earpiece.

_Why won't anyone tell me what's going on_? he thinks.

The guards all look at each other, dread on their faces. At that exact moment, a shrill whistling cuts through the air.

"What?" Dr. Berkman says.

Bright lights strobe in the corners of the room, up near the ceiling.

"Dr. Berkman?" one of the technicians says.

Dr. Berkman finds his mouth too dry to form words. He licks his lips.

"A fire," he says. "Those are the fire alarms. Everyone! Get a move on it!"

The wheeled platform he stands on hovers over the table. He can't get the door latch to unlock. He sits down, slips his legs beneath the rails, and slides off. He stumbles and catches himself on the robot.

"You," he says to one of the guards. "Get up here. No, I don't care that this isn't your job, we needs hands up here! As soon as we're through I want you… to…"

Something has changed. Hub Two is strapped down and still, but something about it has changed. The head. The remaining optic has moved.

_It's looking at me_, Dr. Berkman thinks.

His mind blanks. Suddenly, though the robot is restrained, though its surrounded by the guards and their guns, armed with explosive, high-heat rounds, suddenly Dr. Berkman knows that isn't going to be enough.

"Oh," he says.

* * *

><p>Agent Seymour Simmons twitches. He takes a gulp of air and starts to choke. His eyes snap open. He reaches up to cover his mouth as his lungs hack and heave. Simmons curls into a ball.<p>

_What_? he thinks.

His eyes sting. They're watering and his nose is dripping.

_The hell?_

He's on the floor, covered in some sort of powder. Everything is blurry. He wonders if something is wrong with his eyes until he realizes it's smoke. The air is filled with it. The hall is dark, lit only here and there by a few, flickering lights. The floor shakes. He starts to lift himself up and winces.

He lifts a hand and probes his left side. He hisses as his fingers brush a sore spot.

_Gotta be bruised_, he thinks. _It doesn't hurt enough to be broken._

He coughs again. The air is warm. Down the hall, through the smoke, he sees a soft glow.

_Is it dawn already?_

He rolls onto his un-bruised side. His lungs won't settle down. He lays there and tries to breathe.

_Wait a minute_, he thinks. _I'm in a basement. Basements don't have windows. Then what the hell is __**that**__?_

It can't be sunlight. He wouldn't be able to see sunlight. What it _could_ be is a very large fire.

_Oooh shit_.

"Kid?" he says.

No answer. He doesn't see him anywhere.

"Kid! You in here?"

Nothing.

_Where'd he go?_

The building shudders. Simmons is suddenly aware that he's got another floor beneath him, that a large explosion has ripped through the building, and that, right now, something is burning.

"Come on, Hunter. Give me a shout! Lemme know you're okay."

He coughs. The pain in his ribs flares up. This fit lasts longer than the others. He has to stop and put his head down before he hacks out a lung.

_That can't be good_.

"Hunter! We need to get out of here. Where…"

He spots a dark shape on the ground. It's about ten feet away, closer to the glow. Simmons crawls over, covering his mouth and nose with his tank top. The thing is buried under ceiling tiles. Simmons slides them off and turns it over.

"Ah, geez kid," he says.

Hunter's face is slicked with what Simmons first thinks is blood. In the dim light, it's hard to tell where it's coming from. Simmons looks around for something to wipe it off with. He finds nothing but debris. He looks down at himself. His left pant leg has a long tear in it, from the ankle, up the shin, to his knee.

It's not easy tearing clothing while he's still wearing it. He ends up taking off half the pant leg to do it. He dabs the kid's face. That's when he notices how sticky the stuff is, how much darker than blood it is. Not the red of fresh stuff or the rust of old stuff, but a dark gray, almost black. It's coming from a gash on his forehead, above his right eye. Even in the dark, even with wound still oozing, he can see flesh closing up, scabbing over, starting to shrink.

_Oh, that's just all kinds of freaky_.

Hunter doesn't so much as twitch an eyelid. Simmons sighs and wipes his eyes and nose on his forearm. He can't wait for the kid to wake up. He's going to have to drag him out.

"You look like a heavy bastard," he says.

* * *

><p><em>Something is wrong with Sunstreaker<em>.

That is what fills Sideswipe's mind when he comes online.

He's lying on a table. Humans move around him. One of them stands next to his side, staring at him. Its mouth hangs open. It says something. Sideswipe doesn't understand the words. It starts to back away.

He's pinned down, limbs bolted to the table with metal braces. They're in the way. They're keeping him from Sunny.

He pulls. The restraints hold. He tries again, limb shaking, heaving. Humans scramble and slide off his chest. Dark shapes move on the ground below and his optic covers are slagged, his targeting systems down, but he doesn't need them to know the meat-bags are armed.

Pain in his right wrist. The joint creaks. He can feel it straining and he doesn't stop, _can't_ stop because Sunny is in trouble.

The restraint gives. It tears away with a shriek and he wrenches his hand free. There's still something on his chest. He grabs it. It's a laser-cutter, buried up to the hilt in his internals. He pulls it out. The humans circle around to his head.

The cutter is on, still humming, still glowing. He brings it down on the bolt holding his left wrist. Bullets rip into his armor.

Sideswipe snarls and throws himself to the side. His feet are still secured. The table rocks and slams back. A familiar _pop-hiss_ and one of those small, shiny explosives streaks overhead. It hits the wall in a burst of sparks.

He throws himself to the side again, harder this time. The table tilts. For one nano-klik, it hangs like that, balanced on two legs, and then topples over.

He hits the ground. Humans scream.

He frees his legs and rolls off and lands on his side. A flurry of movement as the organics move in. He's still got the laser-cutter clenched in his hand. He thumbs it, locks it on, and throws it. The glowing tip whirls through the air in an orange blur, right into the center of the group.

The humans collapse.

Sideswipe peeks over the edge of the table and almost gets shot in the face. He ducks down. Rounds slam into the underside of the table. There's another group between him and the doorway, the table his only cover.

Sideswipe gets an idea.

He grabs the edges of the table, sinks into a crouch, and pushes. The screaming takes on a new pitch as the whole thing screeches across the floor at them. Organics scurry out of the way. And then he hits the wall.

He's leaking energon and coolant all over the floor. Everything hurts. He's got a gash running down his front from chin to groin. He has to lean against the wall to stand up.

The few humans still left are standing in a gaggle, staring at him.

"_Go,_" he says.

They all but trip themselves fleeing the room. Only then does he allow himself to slump, one hand clutching the gash.

_Primus_, he thinks. _They got all the way through._

He can feel air brushing where it shouldn't be. When he moves, things shift around in a way that he _knows_ isn't good. His internals are bared, fuel lines exposed. He needs to get out of there. He needs a medic.

_Sunstreaker…_

He needs his brother more.

* * *

><p>Due to a very, very busy school schedule, the next update will be delayed a week. Sorry guys, but oh my god, I'm up to my eyeballs in homework right now. Thank you KayDeeBlu, lildevchick, and starfire201 for your reviews and your support.<p>

Next chapter: Headmaster


	14. Headmaster

**Chapter Fourteen: Headmaster**

The first thing Jerri is aware of is a high-pitched noise. She can't make sense of it. She can hear other things, too, if she focuses: sharp bursts of noise, a clatter, voices. She tries to open her eyes and finds they won't work. Her hand moves sluggishly. It takes another three tries for her to open one eye and she's blinded by light.

"Ungh," she says.

Movement next to her. A warm hand lies on her shoulder.

"Miss Stephens?" a woman says. "Are you awake?"

Jerri manages to drag her hand up to shield her eyes this time. She sees a pink blob hovering over her.

"Miss Stephens?"

"Yeah," she croaks. Her throat is dry. She feels like she might puke.

The blob moves over her head. She can hear soft beeping. When she looks down toward her feet, she sees more shapes rushing by.

A hand grabs her wrist and pulls it away from her face. Fingers touch her cheek and guide her head towards the fuzzy shape—it's a face, she realizes. A smaller light shines right into her eyes.

"Agh, fuck!" Jerri says.

"Sorry," the woman says. "Your pupils are responding normally. That's good. I see no sign of a concussion."

_What?_ Jerri thinks.

"Do you know what day it is?" the woman says.

"Thursday?"

The woman nods. "Excellent. How many fingers am I holding up?"

She has to squint. The blurriness is starting to fade. She counts to three.

"Very good," the woman says. She stops and looks across Jerri's bed. "No! I told you—oh, hold on. Miss Stephens? I'll be right back."

Then she's gone, shouting orders at someone. Jerri lays there and tries to piece together just where the hell she is.

She remembers… remembers… the locker room. After the delivery—a robot and a man. Washing her face, an explosion. She'd gone into the hall, toward the stairs because these people did not pay her enough to put up with this bullshit anymore.

Then a red robot. She ran, ducked into a room only it was filled with Machination guards. The robot followed. She'd shot it and it had gone down and then—

"Oh, son of a bitch," she says.

It had kicked her. The damn robot had _punted_ her into a wall.

Her eyes adjust. She can see people scurrying around the room. Other beds next to her are filled with the wounded. As she watches, a group of nurses or doctors—two guys in navy blue scrubs—trot past with a stretcher between them. They're heading out of the room.

She's lying underneath a blanket. She's not wearing any clothes. Her chest is heavily wrapped in bandages. There's an IV in her left hand and an oxygen tube hooked into her nose.

She starts to sit up and falls back to the bed, gasping.

_Ribs_, she thinks. _Shit, I think they're broken_.

The guy across from her is unconscious. A team of nurses is getting him packed up. Almost all of the beds show the same story. That shrill noise cuts through the air.

_That's an alarm._

Jerri finally manages to swing her legs over the side of the bed. She pushes herself upright, her left arm wrapped around her middle where it hurts the most. Bare feet brush the cold floor.

The staff seems to be working down the line. Six patients separate her from them. She can wait, let them pack her up and ship her out of here. It'd be stupid to go gallivanting off with broken ribs. Another kick by a robot and they could puncture a lung and then she would probably die.

She stands up, reaches out to steady herself on the bed rail as she drags the hospital blanket with her. She pulls off the air tube and the IV. There's a counter on the far side of the room with heaps of clothing on it. It takes a minute for her to get over there. It takes even longer to find a shirt that isn't cut down the middle or soaked in blood or both. She rummages out a pair of pants and belts it with someone's bootlace. The shoes take longer and she has to settle for a pair two sizes too big.

She spots a stack of discarded gear in the corner. Another stretcher team comes huffing up the aisle. She waits until they're past before following them. She digs out an armored vest and manages to ease it on. She grabs a helmet and a gun, slings it over the shoulder that doesn't ache, and follows.

The lights are on in the hallway—barely. The stretcher-bearers take a left. Jerri looks to the right. It's quieter down that way.

_I should have done this months ago_, she thinks.

She turns right.

* * *

><p>Simmons isn't sure they're going to make it. He doubles over, braced against his knees as his lungs spasm and try to leap out of his throat. He shakes. His throat is raw and gritty. The acrid taste of smoke clings to his tongue.<p>

He gags, spits, and stands there, panting. His eyes water. The smoke is so thick he can't see more than a few feet.

_Where the __**hell**__ is the damned exit?_

He's seen no one else. This could be a good thing or a very bad thing.

"Come on, kid," he says. "Wake up already. I don't think I can haul your ass around much longer."

He gets no reply. Simmons wipes his mouth and reaches for the kid's arms again.

A crunch down the hall. Simmons pauses.

Silence.

The smoke swirls in the dim, flickering light. Simmons bends down and squints, trying to see underneath the rolling cloud. There's nothing.

"Huh," he says.

Simmons begins to drag Hunter. The kid weighs a ton. He scrapes along the ground.

A distant patter catches his ear. Simmons stops. He waits a moment and then eases the kid to the floor.

He can't see through the soup that is the air. Not at his height. He crouches, reaching out to brace himself. The floor shudders.

_What is that?_

He kneels, presses his face to the ground. A machine-gun staccato bounces through the tile and into his cheek. The smoke shifts and he catches a glimpse of something far off, something shiny, something _vast_, all of it headed toward him.

"Oh shit," he says.

He climbs back to his feet and hooks both hands underneath Hunter's armpits, careful not to jab out one of his eyes on the pointy fins jutting out of the kid's shoulders. He starts to shuffle backward.

The thing is getting closer. He can feel the vibrations through his shoes. He can hear it, too, tapping and hissing hydraulics.

"Don't even bother running," a deep voice says. "There's nowhere for you to go."

_The fuck?_

It's an NBE. Simmons knows the slight, buzzing tones of their voices. It's a giant goddamn NBE barreling at him full steam and it's laughing.

He doesn't see the piece of ceiling tile until it's too late. He steps on it and feels his foot slide out from beneath him. The next second, he hits the floor. Pain flares up his right hip and jolts his lungs. He starts to hack. He rolls over, onto his hands and knees. His left shoulder protests. He ignores it.

The footsteps slow. He thinks he sees the thing's monstrous bulk outlined in the smoke.

He reaches to his belt, snaps the holster off the gun. He's got six, maybe seven rounds left. It's not enough. If he can hit the eyes, take out its sight, then maybe, _maybe_ they have a chance.

But not by groveling in the middle of the hallway. He grabs Hunter and drags him to the side, toward the wall, where Simmons can at least brace himself. Only his back doesn't hit the wall. It hits nothing at all.

Simmons flails. He almost drops his gun. His right side has slipped through a gap between the doors of an elevator.

"No way," he says.

Something glows in the murk. An orange band some twenty feet up into the air. The NBE is right there.

Simmons puts his back against the edge of one of the doors and grabs the other with both hands. He pushes.

The NBE chitters at him.

His arms shake. His left shoulder is a mess of throbbing ache.

"Come on you bastard," he says. "Move!"

"And just what do you think you're doing?" the NBE says.

The door budges six inches. He's out of time. Simmons sticks his head in. It's dark. The elevator isn't there. He's staring into an empty shaft. They're on sub-level two. That's a drop of maybe ten, twelve feet. It's take his chances or find out what the NBE thinks is so funny.

Simmons latches onto Hunter's foot and drags it through the gap.

"Oh no you don't," the NBE says.

It rushes him. Its bulk fills the hall like a jumbo jet.

Simmons lifts the kid's shoulders. He shoves him across the floor. His legs dangle over the edge. The walls quiver.

He feels the shift in weight as gravity takes over. Hunter is pulled away from him. He disappears into the dark. Simmons has no time to think about it. He catches a glimpse of something big and purple leaping out of the smoke at him.

Simmons jumps. A rush of air ruffles his hair. The purple thing just misses taking his head off. Simmons falls. He starts to windmill. He wants to land in a roll, try to—

_Bam!_

His feet slam into the ground. Simmons falls over, flops onto his back. He groans.

_What?_ he thinks.

He's on a hard, cold surface. A metal spiral lifts up from the floor into the gloom above. It's a cable. He's landed on top of the elevator. The floor of sub-level two is only three feet over his head. He can hop up and touch it.

The faint light spilling down the shaft disappears.

Simmons ducks just as a purple, three-fingered pincher jabs right between the doors. Metal squeals as one of them is torn off. The pincer withdraws and then the NBE sticks its head in.

Its eyes are covered by that orange band. It's got two, three-foot long horns growing out the sides of its head, also bright orange.

"There you are," it says. "We told you, you couldn't get away."

The pincers gouge at the sides, at the wall, tear right through them. Simmons covers his head as debris rains down.

_It's going to bring the entire elevator shaft down on us!_

Air brushes his bare leg. He crouches down as the walls tremble. Another draft, this time on his face. Simmons feels along the floor until he finds it: torn metal, a jagged edge, and beyond that, empty space. There's a gigantic hole on the other side of the shaft.

It's pitch black. For all he knows, it could be a chasm dropping straight into hell. But the elevator is sitting on something.

_Whump!_

A large piece of the wall crashes next to him. He sits down, sticks his legs out, into the void. He starts to slither out.

_God, I hope there's a set of stairs somewhere down there_.

He's about to push off when he realizes that the noise has stopped. He looks up. The shadow is gone. Dim light filters through the hole around the doors.

_What the…?_

A groan. Simmons tears his gaze away from the hole and over to the pointy lump that is Hunter.

"Kid?" he says.

"Ugh," the kid says. "Simmons?"

Simmons laughs weakly. "Yeah. You okay?"

"Why does my head hurt?"

He hears the kid start to move. The pointy lump starts to sit up. Seconds later, a blue light comes on over his eyes and Simmons can see the kid squinting at him.

"Where the hell are we?" Hunter says.

"Elevator shaft. It's a long story."

Hunter cocks his head to the side. He looks past Simmons and into the void.

"You hear that?" he says.

That's when Simmons catches the soft scraping noise coming from the third sub-level. He's suddenly very aware that he's got his legs sticking out into empty, black space. He pulls them in.

"I think we should go," he says.

Hunter is already scrambling up, leaping for the torn floor above them.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe staggers and hits a wall. There are no lights down here. The corridor is solid black. The air is hot. He recognizes the stink of energon burning.<p>

_Someone had an accident_, he thinks and starts to laugh. Only it comes out a thin wheeze.

One hand holds his chest together. The other keeps him from sliding down the wall and to the floor. His joints grate. His feet drag. Something inside chokes and sputters. Liquid bubbles out of the gash and dribbles down his front, along his legs, spatters to the ground. He can feel it.

Sunny tugs at him. He's got to start walking. He can't stay here. He has to move, has to follow, has to find his brother because that pull is getting weaker, getting sicker.

Sideswipe pushes away from the wall and stumbles forward.

He's not sure how long he's been down there, in the dark. He keeps seeing streaks of pink and green, small, flashing dots of white or yellow. It's his processor starting to glitch.

Debris crunches underfoot. The building around him groans. It's dying. It doesn't have much time.

_Hold on, Sunny. I'm almost there. You just… just…_

A sound. Up ahead, a low hum. He looks up.

The hallway is glowing. Sideswipe sways where he stands and squints at it.

About four metras ahead, faint, pink color tints the walls.

_What the…?_

He knows that color, that pale shade of shimmering pink. It's what's leaking out of his chest. It's the trail he's left on the floor.

_Energon? But—_

He doesn't remember crossing the space between them. One moment he's standing there, the next, he catches himself on a doorway and half-falls into a room.

It's large and empty save for the single item in the center. The dim glow hides the details, but Sideswipe can still see dark smears on the floor, scuff marks along the walls, spatters of dried energon. And there, in the very center, is a pedestal with glowing lines of energon running up, into Sunstreaker's head.

"Sunny," he says.

His brother's face is mangled: the framework around his eyes is missing, the optics bare; half of the plating has been ripped from his face, exposing the wiring within; his lower jaw is gone.

He's alive. It's just a whisper of life, but it's there and he's here and for the first time in vorns, Sunny is right there and he's_ so, so alive_.

Sideswipe drags himself forward; halfway across the room his right leg locks up. It doesn't matter. The pain and the aching fatigue don't matter. His fingers trace along the side of Sunny's face. Sideswipe smiles.

"You certainly are persistent."

Sideswipe freezes.

_**No**__._

He turns. Standing in the hall, bulk filling up most of the door, is Scorpinok.

* * *

><p>Hunter is running as fast as he dares. It's too gloomy, the air too thick for him to see more than a few feet, targeting display or no. He can see energy signatures again. The building isn't a black hole anymore, but the dots on the screen over his eyes show people and not debris.<p>

Simmons is once again in his arms. He looks terrible. He's got his tank top hooked up over the lower half of his face. His skin is waxy, his eyes are bloodshot, and he keeps coughing.

Hunter doesn't like the way it sounds. It's a deep, wet hack and Simmons's whole body spasms. He's got to get him to fresh air. Fast.

"Shit," Simmons says after the fit has passed.

"You okay?"

The man waves a hand at him. His face is turned away.

"So…" Hunter says. He waits for Simmons to lift his head. "We're getting close to the Headmaster hangar. There's a lot of energy signatures in there and I don't think they're gonna be happy to see me. Are you in any shape—"

"I'll be fine," Simmons says. His voice is harsh. He clears his throat; it doesn't help much. "I can cover my own ass."

Hunter nods, realizes Simmons isn't looking at him, and says, "Right."

Which is when a guard materializes out of the smoke. Hunter jumps, tries to stop, and hits something lying on the ground. His feet shoot out under him.

"Aaah!"

He hits the ground. Simmons comes down on top of him. Bullets fly where his head had been less than a second before. Simmons has enough sense to roll out of the way. The guard tracks down. Hunter doesn't give him the chance to finish. He kicks out and catches the guard's left knee.

The guard goes down. Instantly, Hunter is on top of him, ripping the gun away. The guy reaches up to claw at his eyes. Hunter leans back and jabs down. The butt of the rifle catches the guard on the side of his head and the man goes limp.

Panting to his right; Simmons crawls over. Hunter hands him the rifle.

"Someone'll have heard that," Simmons says.

Hunter nods.

"Kinda small, ain't he?" Simmons says. The guard's face is turned away. Simmons reaches down and pulls it towards him. He freezes. "Oh."

"Is that…?" Hunter says.

It's a woman. A few tendrils of blonde hair spill out around the edges of her helmet.

"Huh," Simmons says. "Evil organization bent on world domination and at least they're an equal opportunity employer."

He stands up and shoulders the rifle. He looks down the hall and then back over his shoulder. "You coming?"

"Wait," Hunter says. "We're just gonna leave her?"

For a long moment, Simmons stares. Then he says, "Is this your morality thing or is this because she's a she?"

"That… that has nothing to do with it."

"Uh huh."

"It _doesn't_."

Simmons rolls his eyes. "Whatever you say, Romeo."

"Damnit, Simmons, it's not—"

Simmons walks away. Hunter grinds his teeth. He scoops the blonde up and heads after him.

* * *

><p>Simmons waits for the ambush. He waits for the alarmed shouts and sounds of running feet, waits for the bullets to start flying, only it never happens. He's standing outside of a familiar door. The hall is quiet. His throat feels gritty and his lungs give a funny lurch. He chokes back the cough.<p>

He can hear a lot of noise just beyond the door: voices, the rumble of heavy machinery, car engines. It's the sound of someone rushing to cover their ass.

Hunter sidles up next to him, the guard draped in his arms. Simmons almost says something but the look on the kid's face stops him. Hunter sets the woman on the floor. When he stands up, he's got a strained expression on his face.

"Kid?" Simmons says.

"They're moving the Headmasters," Hunter says.

"Yeah. I figured that. What do you wanna do?"

Hunter lifts a hand and makes a shushing motion. He's staring intently at the wall. Simmons checks the hallway again. Still empty. He looks at the guard.

She's got the same armored vest as the others, she had the same weapon as the others. She's wearing the same shirt and pants—though they look baggy. She's got a shoelace tied around her waist as a makeshift belt. The side of her face has an impressive lump on it. It's starting to bruise. Despite that, she looks kind of familiar. He's sure he's seen her—

A change in the noise inside the room and Simmons looks up. Hunter's eyes are narrowed to slits behind his visor. His jaw is clenched. Simmons opens his mouth to ask what he's doing when someone starts shooting.

Simmons ducks and spins around, the rifle off his shoulder and aimed at the door.

Shouting—screaming—and then he hears a strange, grinding whir.

"Come on," Hunter says.

The bullets are not coming through the wall. They're shooting at something inside that room. He glances at the kid who seems to be trying to burn a hole through the wallwith his eyes.

Thumps, getting louder. They sound like footsteps—very, very big ones. Simmons starts to back up.

The wall explodes. Simmons throws his arms over his head and stumbles back as pieces fly past. A large, black _thing_ punches through. Simmons lifts the rifle and takes aim. His finger starts to tighten on the trigger.

"Don't!" Hunter says.

"What?" Simmons says. "Why? What _is_ that?"

The black thing sweeps to the left, gouging out more drywall. Light spills in from the hangar beyond and Simmons catches a glimpse of the Headmaster units all lined up in rows, half-loaded transport trucks lining the far wall. And there, lurking just inside that ragged hole is something silver and gleaming.

Hunter grins.

_It's a hand_, Simmons thinks. _That thing is a giant, goddamn metal hand and it's connected—_

"NBE," he says.

Hunter snorts a laugh.

"Kind of," he says.

That's when it finally dawns on Simmons. "This is… you _connect_ to it."

The kid, that robot body of his, it connects to the NBE body. The boy that can turn into a robot that can turn into a car.

The other hand reaches in, through the hole to join the first.

"You might not want to watch this," the kid says. "It's kind of freaky."

"Like hell," Simmons says.

"Suit yourself."

Even with some inkling of what's going to happen, Simmons still jumps when the kid's arms rotate out of their sockets. His legs twist up and pivot at the hips.

Simmons winces. "Doesn't that hurt?"

"Not really. It feels weird, kind of—"

But then his head folds down over his collar bone and his chest slides up, _over_ his head. His knees pop out backwards. His arms twist around and shrink into themselves, bringing together the strange, window-shutter panels on his forearms and shoulders to form large, pointed fins. Within seconds, Simmons finds himself staring like a slack-jawed idiot at a robotic head.

Two clear, triangular pieces light up blue, the same color as the kid's visor. It's got eyes. They're the size of Simmons's hand.

"Stay here," Hunter says. His voice is louder and a touch deeper. "I'll be right back."

The hands reach around and pick up the head-who-is-Hunter. They pull it backwards, through the hole, and slide it into place on the neck. Simmons hears a rapid clicking and a deep _thump_ and then the head swivels up all on its own.

_Headmaster_, Simmons thinks. _Of course._

Hunter, now a fifteen foot, silver NBE, turns around. Simmons watches the right hand shift back and transform into what can only be a weapon. Gunfire flashes off the shiny plating on his arm as he lifts it. The air fills with a loud buzzing—the unmistakable sound of alien weaponry charging.

The kid takes a step and disappears from view. Simmons is left standing in a smoke-filled hallway next to an unconscious woman with a rifle hanging from his hands. He looks to the woman, to the hole, to the balcony inside.

"'Stay here,'" he says.

Panicked screaming. Something goes _crunch!_ Something else goes _boom!_ The floor shudders.

"The hell I will," Simmons says and plunges through the hole.

* * *

><p>Better late than never?<p>

Next chapter: His Fault


	15. His Fault

**Chapter Fifteen: His Fault**

Her head hurts. Jerri Stephens raises a hand to her throbbing temple and winces. She feels a lump. She cracks an eye open, fully expecting to see blood somewhere. She doesn't. What she does see is smoke and rubble. Everything, the floor, her clothes, is coated in a layer of dust.

She grimaces and spits and tries to clear the grit from her mouth. She starts to climb to her feet. Her hand catches on a jagged edge. A large chunk of plaster wall falls off her lap and onto the floor.

_What the hell happened?_

And then something blows up.

Jerri ducks. Her ribs flare in agony. Her rifle is gone. She has no weapons and very little cover. She lifts herself on her knees to peer through a large hole torn out of the wall.

On the other side of the wall she can see blue flashes and flames and more smoke. Another flash, another _whump-boom!_ Across the room, past line of flaming wreckage, is a ramp leading up to a massive set of hangar doors. One of them is open. She can see the night sky twinkling with stars.

_Wha-boom!_

Dust patters down around her. She looks to her right, to her left. Dark hallway with no sign of an exit in either direction.

Metal shrieks. There's a terrible clatter and then a _car_ sails past the hole. It slams into the wall. Before it can even start to slide down, a bright blue beam engulfs it and it explodes into a ball of flame.

Jerri ducks back down as a wave of heat rolls above her. She peeks back out. The car is burning, the flames green.

_Something_ is wreaking havoc in there. The hall is filled with smoke. The building groans somewhere in its guts. The ramp in the room leads to clear, fresh air.

"Shit," she says.

Jerri creeps forward. She slides one leg over the edge of the hole and then the other and crouches at the base. The room is huge, extending up almost to the ground floor above and another whole level below. She's perched on some sort of grated-metal balcony overlooking the whole thing. She sees no people, only the twisted remains of cars. They're all low-slung, sharp angles. She recognizes the glaring headlights.

Lamborghinis.

_The hell is all this?_ she thinks.

A glint of metal catches her eye.

_Ah._

A giant, silver robot is playing Godzilla. It's got one of the cars held up in the air—a shiny silver one. It swings it down like an awkward, over-sized golf club, and swats a blue one into the wall. The silver car lands on top of the pile and the robot takes aim.

Its weapon hums. The tip glows blue. A bright beam lances out and hits the cars and they go up in a massive fireball.

The balcony shakes. More debris rains down.

_That idiot is going to bring this whole place down!_

When she lifts her head, the robot is stomping over to the next row.

A set of stairs leads down to the floor below. The robot is facing away from her. If she moves fast, she can probably get down it without being spotted. She slinks over to it, one arm wrapped around her ribcage. She takes the first stair carefully, still in a crouch, eyes fixed on the robot. It's too busy stomping the hell out of the row to notice her. She eases down to the next one, reverse-crawling all the way down. Not once does the robot look in her direction.

She has to stop and catch her breath at the bottom. Her chest aches. Her breathing is harsh and shallow. She waits, teeth grinding together, for the pain to die down only it doesn't.

_Damnit_, she thinks, _no time. Move it!_

She heads to the left, keeping low, below the mangled wreckage. She reaches the wall. She's got a clear shot to the ramp from here. There's almost no cover, however, and it's a long sprint even without busted ribs. If the robot spots her and decides that it would rather practice with a moving target…

The back of her neck prickles. Jerri freezes. Slowly, she turns to look behind her.

A man stands not ten feet away with a gun aimed at her head. He's smiling.

"Going somewhere?" he says.

* * *

><p><em><strong>No<strong>_, Sideswipe thinks.

Scorpinok skitters into the room. He's in some kind of insectoid alt-form. Six tapered, sharp legs hold up his bulk. He got two large arms up in front, each one tipped by three-pronged pincers. And arching up over his back is a tail ending in a wicked blade. He fills the door, a purple and green and black monstrosity.

"You know, you may be the most stubborn Autobot we've ever met," Scorpinok says.

Sunny's head is right behind Sideswipe; he's the only barrier between the bug and his brother. Scorpinok stops inside the door. He blocks the only way out. Even if Sideswipe can grab Sunny's head and get past the fragger without getting impaled, it still leaves his spark.

He doesn't see it anywhere in the room. The signal is so weak, it's impossible to pinpoint, even for him.

"You shouldn't be able to move with those injuries," Scorpinok says. One of his legs moves; he edges to Sideswipe's left. "And yet, here you are. Dragged yourself all the way down here. Most impressive. We could have used that spunk."

Sideswipe's right leg trembles. His fingers tingle. The streaks of color in the air have multiplied. He's on the verge of energon deprivation. Soon, he's going to slip into processor-lock. He needs to get Sunny out of here. Now.

Scorpinok seems to realize this. There's no way past him and he's not moving.

"Why are you here?" Sideswipe says. _Why don't you just leave? Why can't you let Sunny leave?_

"You and us are not so different," Scorpinok says, completely ignoring the question. "We're both stubborn. We both go after the things we want with what some might call fanatical ferocity. There is one difference, however."

Two metras between them. Two metras keeping the Headmaster freak from Sunny. It's not enough.

"_We_ do not take chances," Scorpinok says.

He lunges. One of his pincers lashes out. Sideswipe ducks, tries to skip to the side only his right leg crumples beneath his weight. He hits the ground. He looks up, catches sight of one of those spear-tip legs coming straight down at him. He tucks his arms and rolls.

Spindly legs churn around him. Scorpinok's belly rushes past overhead. Then Sideswipe is clear. He skids and comes up in a clumsy crouch. But Scorpinok doesn't charge him. He's not even looking at him, not even facing him. The ion-cannons mounted on his back, at the base of his tail, swivel. They're pointing into the room, aiming for—

"Sunny!"

Scorpinok fires. The room turns white. Sideswipe is hit by a wall of seething hot air. It picks him up and throws him into a wall.

* * *

><p>Sometimes, the universe takes what has been nothing but a giant shit-sundae of a day and, with a flourish, deposits a single, glistening cherry on top. Simmons is staring at such a cherry.<p>

The woman hasn't noticed him yet. She's focused on the rampaging NBE across the room. Simmons can't blame her. The kid is wreaking havoc with what can only be described as glee. He's got to give her some credit, though—he's only had the gun on her for ten seconds before she stiffens and turns around.

"Up," he says.

She rises from her crouch. Her left arm is wrapped around her middle. She sways for a moment.

"Who are you?" Simmons says.

"Sarah Durnam," she says.

It's a lie. They both know it. He moves on.

"So, Sarah, care to tell me what you're doing here?"

She snorts. "What's it look like?"

The building is on fire and possible on the verge of collapse.

"You picked a hell of an exit," Simmons says.

She shrugs her right shoulder. Behind her, Hunter stomps his merry way up the last row of cars. His robot face doesn't really do expressions, but Simmons swears he can see a smile on there. He wipes his forehead on his arm.

"You work in this facility?" Simmons says.

She hesitates. She could be entirely innocent, of course. Building on fire, robot on a rampage, any sane person would stop to consider the wisdom of admitting they did. Probably. But when Sarah does it, what Simmons sees is a big, fat, "No."

Simmons glances over at Hunter and makes a few, quick calculations in his head.

"Okay," he says, "here's the deal. You've got about a minute before he's done over there. He's not in a good mood, but he'll probably listen to me if I tell him not to step on you—I make no guaranties. So why don't you tell me who you are and what, exactly, you're doing here?"

For a long moment the woman just stares at him. She sighs.

"My name is Jerri Stephens," she says. "I'm a technical coordinator and field specialist hired by Epsilon Holdings which, as far as I know, is a front company for an organization known as 'Machination.'"

The silence is broken by the _whump-boom_ of Hunter shooting things.

"Okay," Simmons says because he can't think of anything better.

Field specialist and technical coordinator. In Simmons's line of work, these are the polite names for a jack-of-all-trades, a saboteur, a clean-up operator and occasional hit-man; a mercenary.

"It's gonna be hard to pick up your paycheck now," he says.

Stephens shrugs.

"How much do you know about their operations?" Simmons says.

"A bit. I picked up more information here and there."

"Uh huh. How much?"

"Depends on what you're offering," Stephens says.

It takes serious work to keep his expression neutral. "Legal immunity, provided you give us your full cooperation."

"And non-legal?"

This time, he can't quite keep the smirk off his face.

"And non-legal," he says.

She seems to consider this. She looks around the room, watches a Headmaster unit fly through the air and crash into a wall. She's holding her ribs tight. Her shoulders are tensed. Finally, she nods.

"Deal," she says.

Simmons lowers the gun. He doesn't put it away. Stephens eases back to lean on a piece of wreckage that isn't on fire.

"So what happened to you?" Simmons says.

Stephens looks down at herself.

"I got kicked by a robot," she says.

Simmons winces.

"What's with all that stuff?" Stephens says, jerking her chin to the pile behind him.

She would be, of course, referring to the salvaged goodies Simmons has managed to scrounge together.

"Oh, that," he says. He flutters a hand. "Don't worry about that. It's just…"

A door slams open. A group of three men rush in from underneath the balcony, pushing some sort of wheeled cart. They're six feet into the room when the man in the lead stops. The two men pushing the cart run into him. A silver canister drops off the cart and clatters to the floor.

"Whoa, whoa," Simmons says. The gun comes up. "Stop right there."

Simmons watches Stephens out of the corner of his eye. This is the perfect time to bolt, the perfect time to try to disarm him. But she doesn't. She turns to face the three, and Simmons notices that she's grabbed a charred, metal pipe.

_Classy_, he thinks.

"Hands in the air," Stephens says.

Only one of them complies. The other two—the guy in the lead and the left-hand cart pusher—don't move. The guy on the left reaches for something.

"Bad idea, pal," Simmons says, aiming the gun right at him. "Let's get those hands up, huh?"

"What's going on?" a mechanized voice says.

Simmons glances over without turning his head.

"Hey kid," he says. "Perfect timing."

Hunter leans in over his head; fifteen feet of gleaming robot. He's got char marks up his arms, shimmery, pink spatter on his hands and face. The burning wreckage glints off his silver armor. His face is made out of sharp corners and hard angles and two, blazing blue eyes.

Simmons will never admit it, but he's pretty sure that if he were on the receiving end of that glare, he'd have shit his pants.

The three Machination cronies look like they already did. Their faces drain of color. The one in the back, the one reaching for something, steps away. His hands lift into the air.

"Who are you? What are you doing?" Hunter says. Simmons can hear his voice, the kid's human voice running just above a deeper tone, a strange sort of buzzing.

The guy in the lead swallows. He wears some kind of navy blue surgical scrubs.

Simmons wipes the sweat from his eyes and tries to ignore the way the floor trembles. Hunter crouches. He places one hand on the ground and leans over until he fills the space beneath the balcony.

"You're Machination," he says.

Lead guy tries to back away and hits the cart.

"Please," he says, "please, we—"

Hunter punches the floor. Simmons jumps. One of the trio stumbles and almost falls.

"You. You did this," he jabs a thumb at his chest, "to me."

The kid bends down until his face is a foot from the lead guy. The man bends over backward, halfway lying on the cart with his hands raised as if to ward the Headmaster off.

"Do you have any idea what you did?" Hunter says. "Do you have any idea what it was like? Do you?"

"Please. We… we were just f-following orders," the man says.

"Following orders. You didn't even stop to ask if maybe it wasn't such a good idea, did you? Before you _tore me apart_. Because that just didn't occur to you, _did_ it?"

Simmons finds himself edging away. The cart-pushers both back up. They press themselves against the wall.

"Hey," Simmons says. The kid gives no indication he's heard him. He's practically crawling over the first guy. "Kid."

He reaches over and taps the closest part of the kid's robot body he can touch. He thinks he sees the dark circle of eye behind the glowing, plastic covers flick in his direction.

"My guys are gonna find this place. We're gonna catch these scumbags, huh? All of them. So why don't you ease off a bit, okay?"

For three seconds, no one moves. Stephens is to Simmons's left; she's got an odd look on her face, her head cocked to one side as she stares at the kid.

Hydraulics hiss. Hunter edges back to crouch on his heels. He says nothing. He doesn't even look at Simmons.

Simmons eyeballs the three men and jerks his chin toward the ramp at the other end of the room.

"Out," he says.

They scurry past, giving Hunter a wide berth. Stephens waits another minute and then tosses her pipe to the side.

"Thank you," the kid says.

"Eh," Simmons says. "One of us has to be the morality pet and it sure as hell ain't gonna be me."

Hunter snorts.

Simmons claps his hands together. "So. From the looks of it, I'd say we've done what we set out to do. You've torn the hell out of their toys and the building is probably going to collapse. Why don't we load up and get the hell—

Two things happen at once: Hunter's head whips to the left; he makes a weird sound and starts to stand.

_Ka-WHUMP!_

The floor bucks. Simmons feels a wave blast through the room and through him. He hits the ground before he registers falling.

He coughs and shakes his head. Stephens is using the front end of a smashed Lamborghini to pull herself to her feet. Her face is white. She moves carefully, as if something inside her might break. Simmons rolls over and starts to get up when he notices Hunter.

The kid stands still. He's facing the hallway. He's not moving, not making a sound. The air is filled with a low, tense humming.

"What was that?" Simmons says.

"Weapons fire," Hunter says. "That was Cybertronian weapons fire."

* * *

><p><em>Sideswipe stands in the hall of Ark-22. The corridor is filled with smoke. The sound is muted: blaring alarms, shouting, and an odd buzzing in his head. He hits his audios a few times but it doesn't clear; the buzzing sticks.<em>

_The dust settles. Someone is standing there. A mech. Sunstreaker. His face is blank. He's just staring and staring at Sideswipe. His missile launchers sit on his shoulders. One of the tubes glows hot._

_Sideswipe can't move. He can't think over the noise in his head. Because Sunny's mask slips. For one, small sliver of time Sideswipe can see his terror and bewilderment. Then time moves and it's gone and Sideswipe is so __**sick**__ of it._

_He's in the shuttle bay. He can't look up, won't look up at the blur of gold on the edge of his vision. He can hear the security team readying his brother for transport. He's leaving. Sunny is being sent away._

_Ironhide places a hand on Sideswipe's shoulder._

"_I'm sorry, kid," he says._

_Sideswipe doesn't answer. He's too tired. He's tired of all of it, tired of cleaning up Sunny's messes, tired of being there all the time, tired of watching everything he does, everything he says because he doesn't want to set his twin off._

_He's sick of waiting for things to get better. Because deep down, he knows they never will. The two of them will never be okay. __**Sunstreaker**__ will never be okay._

_The shuttle engines power up. There are no windows. He can't look in one last time to see his brother and he's glad. He doesn't want Sunny to be able to look back and see him. Because for the first time in a long while, Sideswipe feels relief._

* * *

><p>The room is on fire. He's staring at the wall. He knows it's on fire because he can see the flicker of the light, he can feel the heat on his back. It's wrong. He knows that. He should be doing something, he <em>needs<em> to be doing something but he can't think of what it is.

He's too tired. He hurts too much. It's so much easier to lie there and try to forget about it. Except for the buzzing in his audios. He can't tell where it's coming from. He grumbles and swats at it and it just gets louder.

Something is very wrong.

His chest hurts. It's a weird pain, a deep pain. He's never felt anything like it. It's a dark, smothering tendril of ice brushing against his spark.

A scrape; something chitters. A large shadow moves on the wall.

"Hmm. You're still alive."

The dark thing inside shudders. Sideswipe looks up.

Scorpinok looms over him. His left pincer holds something small and black, something with a pointed fin sticking out the side of it—

_Sunstreaker._

The pedestal is gone. All that remains is a heap of scorched metal and burning energon. All that remains is Sunny's head; his blackened, mangled head and—_his spark, where—_

Sideswipe can't sense it.

_No._

It's not there.

_It __**is**__ here. It has to be!_

All he feels is that cold numbness coiling around inside. All he feels is the heaviness in his limbs and a distant, roaring ache.

_No. That's not possible. It's not._

"Ah well," Scorpinok says. He tosses Sunny's head over his shoulder. "That's easily remedied."

Sunny's head hits the ground. Sideswipe sees it hit, sees it bounce, sees it roll. His brother's burnt, dark, dead head clangs across the floor.

Scorpinok rears above him. Even without a real face, he's still smirking.

It's his fault. Scorpinok did this. He took Sunny. He hurt him. It's his fault.

_Kill him._

The Headmaster's pincer comes down. Sideswipe moves. It pounds into the ground right behind him, the shock races through the floor. He's already on his feet, coming around. He grabs the sides of Scorpinok's head and wrenches him close.

"I'm going to _kill_ you," he says.

He buries his fist in the freak's face. Scorpinok stumbles back. Sideswipe charges after him.

* * *

><p>Weapons fire. It has a distinctive energy reading, something no human weapon can match.<p>

"What," Simmons says, "like an NBE?"

"Yeah," Hunter says.

_But how?_ he thinks. _Who?_

The entire room is shakes. Hunter hears a crack. A piece of the ceiling breaks off and smashes to the floor. The whole thing sways. It's slight—he doubts Simmons even feels it—but he can sense it the same way he can tell the percentage of smoke versus oxygen in the air and the way he notices that Simmons's heart rate has jumped.

"While you two are standing around chatting, I'm going to get out of here," someone says.

There's a woman next to his left leg. She's covered in dust. The black helmet over her head has been knocked askew and he can see her blonde hair. It's the guard from the hall.

"How did you…?" he says.

"Never mind that," Simmons says. "Stephens is right. The whole place might come down on top of us any second."

"What about—"

"Probably a weapons storage went up. These guys run around with high-tech explosives, you set the building on fire, their stash goes boom. I say we bail."

"Yeah," Hunter says. He forces himself to turn away.

"Great," Simmons says. "You got trunk space, right?"

"_Why?_"

Which is when he sees the mound of junk next to the wall. Circuitry, armor plating, what looks like pieces of a missile launcher, all piled together into a scrapheap of Headmaster parts. Simmons grins at him.

"No," Hunter says.

The grin falls.

"Why not?" Simmons says.

"We don't have time for you to go loading up on souvenirs."

"These aren't souvenirs. This is national security. This is helping our country, our _planet_ defend itself against an alien threat—"

"Simmons, no."

"—that you seem oblivious to. Now, if you want to go and jeopardize—"

"I'm not jeopardizing anything."

"—the lives of billions of civilians—"

"You're blowing this out of proportion. You just want—"

"—be my guest. But I have a duty, young man—"

"Duty. Right. That's what you call scavenging—"

"I have a duty to the people of this planet—"

"To _yourself_."

"To the _planet_."

"Right. Because you're saving the world—"

"Oh yeah, kid. This coming from you? That's rich."

"No. Don't even try to pull that card. I know you, Simmons—"

"You don't know jack shit."

"—and you're not going to bullshit your way into—"

"Good _god_," the woman says.

Hunter shuts up.

She stands there, her eyes squinted, her upper lip pulled back in disgust.

"Are you two done?" she says.

He feels all of six years old. He's actually glad the robotic face moves because inside, his real cheeks burn.

Simmons lifts his eyebrows and says, "Well, kid?"

_Arrogant, self-righteous, son of a bitch_, Hunter thinks.

He transforms. Fifteen seconds of crumpling, folding limbs and his world goes black. For two seconds, everything goes dark. Then the visor over his eyes lights up and he can see outside. It's always disorienting at first. He can see in multiple directions at once and his brain has to adjust. The sensors embedded in his armor all activate and he's hyperaware of everything: the heat coming off the wreckage around him, the motion of the floor, the way the ceiling undulates, and the two, faint bio-electrical signals next to him.

"Kid?" Simmons says.

"What?" Hunter says.

"Oh good, you're not dead."

"Fuck you."

A hand grabs the door handle on the drivers side.

"Alright, open up," Simmons says.

Through his tires, Hunter can feel more than hear steel groaning and the floor sagging. Something thuds way down in the guts of the building.

_How hot does energon burn?_

Weight in the passengers side. Stephens eases herself in. Her muscles are tensed and she's breathing fast and shallow.

"Are you alright?" Hunter says.

"No," she says. She has one leg in. She sits there, perched halfway in the door. She grunts and the breath hisses between her teeth.

"What happened?" he says.

"I got kicked by a robot."

"Oh," Hunter says. He stops.

_What._

"What robot?" he says. "Where? When?"

She tenses again. Her pulse spikes.

"Does it matter?" she says.

Which is the wrong thing to say.

"Stephens, was it?" Hunter says. "Please. What robot?"

She sighs. "Big, mean, red. He came charging down an elevator shaft. I ran but I got cornered so I shot him. He didn't stay down. Then I got kicked into a wall and woke up in the infirmary."

_Oh god. No way. It can't—there's no way…_

"Did the robot have a black helmet? Two, stubby horns?"

_Please say no. Please don't let it be him. Let it be another Autobot, let it be a Decepticon,_ Hunter thinks. Because if she says yes, if it's who he knows it has to be… there's only one reason he would fight his way into this place and it isn't to rescue Hunter.

"I don't know about horns," Stephens says. "I didn't stop to look. But its head was black, yeah."

Oh christ. It's Sideswipe. It has to be him. He was here, might still be here, which means—

"Stephens," he says. His voice sounds weird, even to him. "Where was he going? What was he doing?"

"Tearing through personnel, mostly. But they were between him and the other one, the head. He was focused on that."

The head. The _head_. Hunter has seen him. Oh god, he'd seen him when they brought him in. Wired into a pedestal, face all mangled, eyes dark and dead.

Sunstreaker. Sunstreaker is here and Sideswipe came for him and Hunter blew the building up.

The sounds through the floor—the vibrations he thought was the building dying, they're something else.

"Okay," Simmons says. He's got an armload of parts. "If you just—"

"Out," Hunter says.

Simmons stops. His eyebrows come together.

"Excuse me?" he says.

"Get out," Hunter says. Stephens is crouched in his door. He drops down on his tires and she stumbles away.

"Whoa kid! What the hell?"

Hunter transforms. Pieces fly out and jumble back together as he climbs to his feet. Before his robot eyes come on, he's already looking deeper into the building, past the wall, to where the explosion came from. He's not sure what he's looking for. Anything that could be Sideswipe. And sound, any energy trace, any—

"Hey!" Simmons says.

"_What_?" Hunter says.

Simmons takes a step back.

"You wanna calm down and tell me what's going on?" the agent says. "Because you just threw Stephens out—"

Hunter looks to find her clinging to one of the Headmaster husks and says, "Sorry."

Her face is pale, she's hugging her middle, but she nods.

"Hunter," Simmons says. He's put down his armload of trinkets. If Hunter didn't know any better, he'd swear the man looks worried.

"What's got into you?" he says.

"It's Sideswipe," Hunter says.

Simmons blinks. "What about him?"

"He's here. He's right here, right now."

"So?"

Hunter pulls himself from the frantic search and back to reality.

"What do you mean, 'so?'" he says.

"I mean, 'what does it matter?'" Simmons says. "He left us to rot. Let's return the favor and _vamos_."

"No, you don't get it. It's not just Sideswipe. Sunstreaker's here, too."

"In case you haven't noticed, we were in a big rush to get out before the ceiling comes down and kills us all. You remember that, right? You don't have time for heroics right now."

"Simmons, where do you think they got the design for the Headmasters? They're based on Sunstreaker. This body is built like him. I was in his _head_. I was with him when they caught us, when they…"

For the first time in ever, Simmons looks at him not with a smirk, not with smugness, and not with mockery in his eyes. He runs a hand through his hair and sighs.

"Ah," he says.

"I can't leave him here," Hunter says. "I can't."

"You think he's still alive?"

Hunter pauses. Sunstreaker's head had looked horrible. His eyes had been fixed and unmoving. He'd looked dead. He'd felt dead.

"It doesn't matter," Hunter says.

Simmons doesn't say anything.

"Look," Hunter says. "I'm not asking permission. I'm not asking you to wait for me. Go. Both of you, get out of here. Go back to the FBI or whoever the hell it is you really work for, and let them know about this place. You already know about Epsilon Holdings. Track them down and get rid of them. But I'm going back for Sunstreaker, okay?"

"Okay," Simmons says.

Stephens's eyes look a little glazed. But she looks up when Hunter turns to her.

"I'm sorry," he says. "For… you know. Just get out of here, alright?"

She nods again.

"Go, kid," Simmons says.

Then Hunter turns around and tears through the wall, out into the hall, to descend back into the inferno.

* * *

><p>Next chapter: I'm Sorry.<p> 


	16. I'm Sorry

**Chapter Sixteen: I'm Sorry**

Simmons puffs his cheeks out and blows a sigh. Hunter's footsteps pound down the hall and then disappear. He shakes his head.

"Damn," he says.

The air has taken on an ominous, dark gray tint. The wide expanse of the room is filled with twisted, broken car frames, many of them still burning. Simmons rubs his forearm across his eyes and forehead. Sweat trickles between his shoulder blades. Way deep down in the bowels of the place something roars. The walls tremble.

"Good luck, kid," he says.

Stephens huddles against a Headmaster frame. Her eyes are closed and her face is scrunched up in pain. He crouches down next to her.

"Can you stand?" Simmons says.

"I think so," she says.

"Sorry about him. He can be impulsive."

Stephens grunts. Simmons grabs her by the elbow and helps hoist her up.

"_S__hit_," she says.

She sways into him. The ramp is still a few hundred feet away. Stephens doesn't look like she can manage that walk on her own. Simmons eyeballs the stockpile of parts.

"Damnit," he says.

And then he spots the shiny canister lying a few feet away. It's got handles. He darts over, scoops it up, and hurries back.

"Come on," he says.

He sidles up next to her, ducks below her left arm and pulls it over his shoulder. She takes a few steps and stops. She looks down at the canister bumping into her right hip. When she looks over at Simmons, her face is blank in a very disapproving kind of way.

"Yeah, yeah," he says. "Let's just get out of here."

She rolls her eyes.

Originally, the room had been filled with neat, orderly rows of fake-car death machines. Hunter changed that. Every ten feet or so they have to go around a chewed up Headmaster. They burn hot. Sweat drips into Simmons's eyes but he has no time to stop and wipe it away. By the time they've made it halfway across his lungs are hitching and Stephens's feet drag.

They've got about one hundred feet to go when the tickling in Simmons's chest becomes unbearable. His lungs spasm. He lets go of Stephens and spins away. He coughs deep and spits up a glob of dark phlegm. He takes a moment to try to get himself to breathe normally.

And then the floor dips.

Simmons looks at Stephens. Stephens looks at Simmons.

They run. Beneath their feet the ground tilts. Smaller pieces of wreckage slither along the concrete. The ramp is only fifty feet away. Simmons is wheezing. Stephens is making harsh, gasping moans as she clutches at her ribs and they don't stop, they don't slow down. A bigger piece scrapes by less than a foot from Simmons.

The cement quivers. Simmons hears a _pop_ and a sharp _crack!_

Up the ramp he can see the night sky. Twinkling stars and the wail of sirens and a faint whiff of cool, fresh air.

The building roars. The air vibrates with a cacophony of shrieking metal and a god-awful tearing noise that Simmons knows is the sound of hundreds of tons of concrete and steel shredding and chewing itself apart. The sound quakes in his bones.

His feet hit the ramp and carry him up. Stephens staggers behind as a blast of searing air billows around them. He reaches back, grabs a fistful of her shirt to make sure she's still there and together, they stumble out onto flat ground and keep running.

* * *

><p>Hunter's not sure what he's looking for. He's not sure whether the targeting program keeps fritzing out because of the fire, or because he's in the basement of Machination and likely surrounded by all kind of weird-ass weaponry. He can't pinpoint Sideswipe. Screwball energy signatures keep popping up and then disappearing the second he looks at them. None of which are Sideswipe. Or Sunstreaker.<p>

He can't actually see the hallway; there's too much smoke. But he doesn't need eyes to navigate. What he sees is black smoke. What he knows is that he's got eight feet of clearance on either side, and another ten above his head. He knows that there's a great, big hole punched into the wall fifteen feet further down the hall. It's the elevator Simmons had tossed him down. The doors are gone. The sides are gouged out. There's enough room for him to slip through.

The cement vibrates under his feet. Something is going on in the floor below his—sub-basement three, the deepest level in this pit.

_Shit_, he thinks. _That's gotta be weapons fire. Who the hell is Sideswipe shooting at?_

He feels a rush of cold run through him; it has nothing to do with the temperature.

The elevator shaft is dark. Super-heated air billows out of the gaping hole. The cables inside make an odd, twanging sound. The shaft has turned into an immense oven—the cables sag like overcooked spaghetti.

_Holy shit._

He's nowhere near the energon storage room. So unless the fire spread all the way over here—and it hasn't, he'd see it—something else is causing that. Something else is blasting up hot air.

_Can I even get down there?_

He can actually feel the difference in temperature when he sticks his hand in. It doesn't hurt him. He doesn't have skin to burn. His body just notes the heat and wires the information to his brain.

Sideswipe is down there. Sunstreaker must be down there, too.

"Shit," Hunter says.

He places both hands on the opening and leans in. There's another hole busted out of the opposite side, above the elevator. Hunter has a pretty good idea what might have made it.

_This is stupid_, he thinks. _This is so, so stupid._

But he doesn't turn back. Even as a portion of his brain yammers to run, run, run like hell, Hunter steps into the shaft. His foot sinks into the top of the elevator.

He doesn't catch fire. He doesn't blow up. His visor doesn't start screaming warnings at him.

Hunter scurries across and ducks through the hole and drops into sub-basement three. To his left: dark hallway. To his right: flickers of fire and noise. Someone screams.

If Hunter had hair, it's be standing up. His feet won't move. He stands there, rooted to the spot.

It's Sideswipe. That was his voice. He's screaming.

_Oh god.  
><em>

He takes a step. Then another. The noise gets louder. Crashing, banging, sounds of pain, the sounds of a fight. Hunter wants to stop, he wants to turn around, but he finds himself unable. He's drawn onward, his stomach twisting up.

An open door just ahead. Inside is flame and something large and dark. Something that chitters. Something that moves all wrong, not on two legs, not like a person. He catches a glimpse of purple and black and green, an arching tail, and two, massive pincers.

He's seen this thing before. Dread slams into him, punches out his stomach, and he can't move.

The thing circles something else, something that snarls in Cybertronian. A smaller form kneels on the floor. Red and black and silver, armor all torn up.

Sideswipe.

A soft noise leaves Hunter's throat before he can stop himself. The bug's head whips around.

"You!" it says.

That voice—he's heard it before, too, from a head dangling from a ceiling. He'd been drugged, unable to feel his limbs and his vision kept swimming, but he'd seen it, he'd heard it. That voice all laced with static, garbled words telling the men holding him that he could still be of use. This thing. This is Machination.

"You little _wretch_," it says. Its legs churn as is spins around to face him. "We are going to rip that ungrateful head right out of that body!"

_Oh god._

Hunter backs away. The monster advances on him, tail arched up. The fire light glitters along the bladed tip. Sideswipe is still in there. He hasn't moved. He stares at Hunter but he hasn't moved and that bug is coming at him and oh shit, oh shit, he's gonna—

Hunter's visor lights up red. The ground quakes. The bug stops. The air fills with a terrible roar.

"No!" the bug says. It looks up.

A chunk of ceiling comes down right on top of it. The entire hall vibrates. Sideswipe isn't moving, isn't doing anything. Hunter senses vast movement overhead. The building is coming down.

"Sideswipe!" he says.

Then Sideswipe is up, scrambling away, arms stretched out toward something small and black on the floor. And then the ceiling collapses.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe hits a wall. He doesn't feel the impact because Scorpinok is <em>right there<em>. One of his spindly legs lifts. Sideswipe ducks as the appendage harpoons the wall where his head had been. He scrambles underneath the monstrosity. Scorpinok snarls and pivots to the side.

He's fast. He's way too fast.

Sideswipe's body is shutting down. His legs are dead weights, his arms all but useless. His coolant keeps choking up. He's bleeding energon through his insides and out, onto the floor. As he comes to his feet and tries to backpedal his foot hits a patch of it and slides out from under him. He lands flat on his back.

"Hold still!" Scorpinok says.

His tail comes up. Sideswipe rolls. He's not fast enough. The blade slams into his left shoulder. Armor tears. But he wrenches himself free. He manages to stumble away, his arm dangling.

_No! Not now!_

Sunny. He has to be here. He can't be gone and Sideswipe needs to find him and to do that he has to smear this thing's face all over the room and he has to get up, get up!

"There," Scorpinok says. "That's not so hard, is it?"

_Move it! Move it you stupid fragger!_

His arms won't move. His legs won't move. His vision swims.

_No, no, not like this._

A soft noise, not even a word. Scorpinok stops.

"You!" he says.

A familiar frame stands out in the hall, silver armor shining. Sideswipe knows that frame; he knows those stupid head fins.

"Sunny?" Sideswipe says. _When did you change your coloring?_

"You little wretch," Scorpinok says. "We are going to rip that ungrateful head right out of that body!"

Sunny backs up.

_No, Sunny, run! Get out of here! You can't fight him!_

The air shakes.

"No!" Scorpinok says.

_Sunny, go! I'll get you!_

"Sideswipe!"

His head, his head, he needs to get his brother's head. Not the silver one, but the other one. Sideswipe is up and after it. Something flashes green out of the corner of his vision. Sunny is running at him. Sideswipe hits the floor. His fingers brush his twin's head. The building comes down.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe can't see. He looks to the left, to the right, up, and down. Everything is dark. There's a massive weight on his left arm and his legs. He can hear a low groaning and creaking. The air is hot. It reeks of burning.<p>

_Am I dead?_ he thinks.

His arm really hurts. He tries to move it, tries to clench his fingers but his arm doesn't move. His legs won't, either. He starts to sit up and bangs his head. Sideswipe falls back.

_The slag?_

A low rumbling sound in the distance. He can make out a muffled wailing, rising and falling. He thinks he knows that sound. He's sure he could place it if he really tried. But right now, he needs to know why he can't move.

He manages to twist around. His other hand traces along his unmoving one until it hits something smooth and solid. It extends as far as he can reach in all directions. It's pinned his arm just below the elbow.

_What happened?_

He remembers pain. He remembers rage. He remembers getting slammed into a wall and an ugly face leering at him. Scorpinok. He'd done something, hurt—

"Sunny!" Sideswipe says.

Sunny. He's here. He needs to find him. He has to get him out.

He pulls his arm. He's got to get up, got to find his brother. The arm doesn't budge. It's got a slab of concrete crushing it into the ground. Sideswipe pulls again, thrashes, tries to wrench himself free.

_Slaggit!_

His legs. If he can bring those up…

He can move his right leg, bend it at the knee, drag it up. His thighs scrape together. Armor screeches against the debris around him. His foot catches on something and it takes a second to wiggle it out.

_Sunny. He's here._

Sideswipe has to get him.

The second leg is easier to slide out. He's lying in a small space, a pocket of air just big enough for him to wriggle around and plant both feet on the slab holding his arm.

He's got to get free because he's got to find his brother.

Sideswipe pushes. His elbow creaks. His legs shake. He can feel warm, tingling liquid running along his waist and chest. He doesn't' stop. The slab groans. Something overhead shifts. Small pieces patter down around him.

He doesn't stop.

"Come on," he says.

He kicks the slab once, twice, three times. A shaft of metal screeches and the whole pile drops a few centi-metras over his head. He jerks his arm back and forth. His whole body shakes. He can feel cables pulling taut in his arm, quivering, fraying.

"Come _on!_"

The slab shifts. Something breaks away and hits the side of his face. A final tug, a hideous screech, and Sideswipe's arm tears free. He falls back.

_Sunstreaker._

He's got to get up and find Sunny. He rolls onto his hands and knees in a cramped crouch.

_He's here. Find him._

Sideswipe starts to dig.

* * *

><p>Someone is kicking him in the head. Hunter opens his eyes.<p>

_What the hell?_

He can't see anything. He's lying on his side. His legs are curled up, his arms tucked close to his chest. Something presses down on his neck. Hunter tries to sit up. Pain lances through his head and spikes behind his eyes.

"Ah!" he says.

The banging against his head stops.

_Where am I? What happened?_

He can move. Not much, not before his hands scrape concrete and metal, but it's enough to reach up and feel the beam lying on his neck.

_Oh shit._

The building has collapsed. He's lying in the deepest basement and it's collapsed. He's been buried alive.

"Sunny?" a voice says.

_What the—_

"_Sideswipe_?" Hunter says.

A pause.

"Sideswipe, it's Hunter! Are you… where are you?"

He tries to move again, tries to duck out. But the beam shifts and Hunter chokes back a yelp. He feels along the thing, trying to find the end or a gap he can squeeze his head through. Both sides disappear into the wreckage around him. He can slip a hand over the top; his fingers brush the back of his head. He's lying on his side with his face twisted around and pressed into the floor.

"Sideswipe?" he says.

A scuffling sound. Then, "Hunter. Oh."

"I… I'm stuck," Hunter says. "Are you there? Do you think you can reach me?"

But Sideswipe doesn't answer. The scraping noise starts up again, further away this time.

"Hello? Sideswipe?"

No answer.

"Shit."

_Okay,_ he thinks. _Don't freak out. Just stay calm. Sideswipe is over there. He was talking, so he's not dead. He didn't sound like he was freaked out or anything. You need to stay calm._

The beam lies right where Hunter connects to the body. The locks holding him in place strain. If he panics, if he starts to thrash around, he could break his neck. He's trapped underneath a collapsed building that's probably still on fire and Sideswipe is ignoring him or he's passed out and—

_Stop it._

His body is free. He can move all of his limbs. He's only pinned at the neck.

"Oh," Hunter says.

He's a Headmaster. He can detach his head.

_Duh._

Of course, if that's the only thing holding the debris up, then the second the locks release the weight of it all could tear through and break his neck anyway. Hunter lies there and listens to scraping and the groans and moans of the building shifting and settling around him. He realizes that he can wait there for someone to dig him out and hope that they don't shoot him and take him back for dissection, or he can take his chances.

Hunter triggers the release. A set of rapid clicks as his head unlocks and the whole thing screeches and good _god_, he can feel that in his teeth. Then he drops away, clatters to the floor. He rocks back and forth between the head finds and stares up at the ceiling of his little air pocket.

"Whoa," he says.

His optic covers are on. They fill the space with dim, blue light. It's a mess. He's surrounded in twisted metal and chunks of concrete and broken pipes. The air is hot and filled with the smell of burning wire and dust and the odd tang of energon. He can just see the glint of armor beyond a large, steel beam.

There's a slab of concrete over the beam. Hunter can make out a dark line where it ends. If his body can lift that without bringing the whole thing down, it can get through. He focuses. The armor shifts. Two black hands appear in the gap. Hydraulics hiss and his joints creak and the slab shifts. Dust falls. Something nearby crashes. The body freezes. When nothing else drops, it starts to move again, sliding the slab over to one side. When there's enough room, it slips through.

It's one of the creepiest things Hunter has ever seen. A giant, silver body slithering through a gap in the dark. No head, just arms and a torso and legs. It crouches down over him, squatting like a frog. Hunter lies between its feet. It reaches down and picks him up and turns him. A moment later, and he's nestled between shoulders once again.

"Sideswipe?" he says.

No answer.

The scritching, scratching hasn't stopped. It comes from Hunter's left. He spots a gap in all the junk big enough to stick his head through. He looks up. His visor shows nothing. He can hear sirens—really, really faint ones. There are people up there.

The gap turns out to be a crevasse. He's got just enough room to slide in.

Hunter has never been claustrophobic. He's never understood how anyone could get freaked out by small spaces. But now, as he shimmies his way past sparking wires, his armor scraping on ragged edges, through puddles he doesn't dare identify, over and under broken steel, all the while listening to the eerie groans and deep thrums and the occasional, distant roar of something else tumbling down, he begins to.

"Sideswipe!"

The noise doesn't stop. It's louder, now. He can see a black hole up ahead. The sound of metal scraping floats through it. Another minute of twisting and climbing and he's there.

The hole is too small to fit all of him. He pokes his head through.

Movement. A dark shape squats about five feet away, pressed on all sides by the debris. Light glints off armor. It's turned away, bent low over something Hunter can't see. The right arm moves, the left is still, tucked close to his chest. In the dim light, the armor looks purple, but there's no mistaking that black helm and the stubby horns.

"Sideswipe," Hunter says.

The Autobot doesn't answer. He doesn't turn around or even stop whatever it is he's doing.

"Hey," Hunter says.

The red mech doesn't acknowledge him. He mutters something too low for Hunter to hear.

The edges of the hole look loose. Hunter reaches up and pushes at a piece. Rubble clatters as it slides away. Sideswipe doesn't look up. Hunter gets his head and shoulders through and then something sticks.

"Goddamnit," he says.

He twists and pulls. Armor rasps. He kicks his legs and suddenly he's free. He tumbles down and crashes against Sideswipe.

Sideswipe snarls. He spins around, his right arm cocked back. Hunter scrambles away, his hands raised in front of him.

"No, no!" he says. "It's me!"

Sideswipe stops. In that hot, stinking hole, time itself freezes.

_Oh my god._

Sideswipe's face is a mess. The glowing panels over his eyes are gone. The left eye is a mangled hole filled with tangled wire. Pieces of his armor have been torn off. What's left, is covered in patches of dark gray. His entire front is a shining smear of energon. Hunter can see _inside_ his chest.

"Sideswipe," he says. "What…?"

His left arm is dislocated. The panels are peeled back around the edges, exposing wire and the joint itself. His forearm looks like it came through a meat grinder; strips of it hang off and the rest of it is a crushed mess. But that's not what makes Hunter's stomach lurch.

He's got Sunstreaker's head cradled against his chest. Hunter thinks it's Sunstreaker's head, anyway. He can make out one of the fins. The rest of it is a charred lump.

"God," he says. "What happened?"

Sideswipe's remaining optic whirs as he focuses on Hunter. His snarl disappears.

"Oh," he says. "It's you."

Hunter can't speak. His brain won't form words. He just stares and reminds himself that he doesn't have a stomach and he's physically incapable of throwing up.

"Good," Sideswipe says. His voice sounds weird, light, totally detached. "Good. You can help."

He turns away. The scraping starts again. Hunter swallows. The muscles catch in his throat.

"Sideswipe," he says. It's almost painful getting that word out. "Hey… Sideswipe."

The 'bot doesn't look up. He's muttering. This time Hunter is close enough to hear, but Sideswipe isn't speaking in English. Hunter catches what he thinks is Sunstreaker's name, over and over, like a chant.

He digs. Sideswipe's fingers scrabble over a solid piece of wall covered in energon. It's coming from him. The tips of his fingers are shorn off.

Hunter is going to puke. His throat tightens. He has to turn away and swallow a few times and try not to listen to Sideswipe calling his brother's name over and over and over.

_Oh god_, he thinks. _Oh my god._

A few minutes later, when Hunter can open his eyes without shuddering, he turns back at Sideswipe pawing at the rubble. Hunter licks his lips. He reaches up to put a hand on the 'bot's shoulder and hesitates.

"Sideswipe?" he says.

"What?"

"What… what are you doing?"

In that same, detached tone, he says, "Getting Sunny."

Hunter's gaze flicks to the lump nestled in the crook of his arm. He looks away.

"Sideswipe, you're already holding him."

Sideswipe shakes his head. "Not his spark. It's still out there. I've gotta get it so we can go."

Hunter scans the wall and everything beyond it. There's nothing. There's no trace of an energy signature of any kind.

"There's nothing there," Hunter says.

The awful scraping stops. Sideswipe stares down.

"You don't understand," he says. "We're split-spark twins. He's part of me. I would know if… if…"

The floor trembles. Wreckage slides overhead and Hunter ducks as a small piece clips his shoulder. The shaking goes on for another half a minute and stops.

"We've got to get out of here," Hunter says.

Sideswipe shakes his head. "No. Not without Sunny."

Again, Hunter's eyes are drawn to Sideswipe's left arm. The mech himself doesn't sound so good. Something inside him grinds and sputters. Energon oozes down his front.

"Sideswipe, look at what you're holding. There's no way Sunstreaker could… could still be…"

He can't say "alive." He can't finish the sentence.

For the first time, Sideswipe seems to notice the thing in his arms. He reaches down and brushes it with torn fingertips.

"No," he says. He hunches down, curls around the lump. "You're just a human. You don't get it. I can _save_ him. I can fix this. I can…"

"I'm sorry," Hunter says. "I really, really am. He—your brother tried to help me. He didn't deserve this."

Sideswipe doesn't say anything.

Hunter chews on his lip. He scans the wreckage again. Still nothing.

"If there were anything out there, I would help you. I would help him even if it meant digging the whole place up. But there's nothing out there. Please, you have to go."

He lays a hand on Sideswipe's shoulder.

"No!" Sideswipe says.

His fist smashes into Hunter's face. Hunter smacks into the wall and slides down into a sprawl. Noise fills the air. Sideswipe yells in Cybertronian. Hunter manages to open his eyes. He sees a flurry of movement.

Sideswipe attacks the wall. His fist slams into the concrete slab. It cracks and jolts back. The ceiling groans. Hunter rolls to the side to avoid being skewered by a piece of rebar.

"Sideswipe! Stop it!"

The mech ignores him. He falls back and kicks the wall, screaming.

Hunter staggers to his feet. The floor lurches beneath him. Sideswipe stumbles but it doesn't faze him. He just gets up and starts clawing. Hunter lunges. He hits the mech and they both go down. Sideswipe's elbow whips around and smashes into the side of Hunter's head.

The tunnel he crawled out of implodes. A cloud of dust billows into their alcove.

"Sideswipe, you have to stop!"

But Sideswipe is beyond listening. He scrambles up. Hunter grabs one of his legs and pulls him back down. He rolls over and tries to grab his arm or his legs, something to pin him. Sideswipe thrashes and almost bucks him off. His chest makes an awful screech. Energon bubbles out of the corner of his mouth.

"Stop it!" Hunter says. "You're gonna kill yourself!"

Sideswipe wrenches his arm free. Hunter tries to grab it but the 'bot twists his legs and Hunter falls away. Instantly, Sideswipe is on him. His hand clamps onto Hunter's face and he begins to squeeze.

"Agh! Stop!"

His own fingers scrabble over Sideswipe's arm. He can feel the pressure in his real body. Warnings flash over his eyes. The armor over his cyborg chest buckles. Sideswipe presses down with monstrous strength.

He claws at Sideswipe's face. The mech doesn't seem to feel it. Rubble shifts beneath him, energon drips down onto his own face and chest. All the while Sideswipe snarls and squeezes and if Hunter doesn't do something _right now_ he's going to die.

His hand brushes a length of metal. Hunter fumbles and then grabs it and whips it through the air as hard as he can.

The pipe slams into the side of Sideswipe's helm. The demon grip on Hunter's face slackens. Hunter shoves the hand away and hits the mech again. Sideswipe lets out an agonized wheeze and slumps against him.

Hunter lays there and trembles. The pipe clatters to the ground. He lifts a shaking hand and pushes Sideswipe off of him. Hunter sits up.

Sideswipe doesn't move. Hunter bends down. He can hear the gurgle of struggling machinery inside him.

He sits back.

_Oh god, this is so fucked up._

Sideswipe clutches his brother's head. Not once did he let go. Even unconscious, he's got it in a death grip.

Cool air brushes the side of his face. He pulls his legs out from beneath Sideswipe and curls in on himself. He closes his eyes.

He hopes Simmons made it out because all he wants to do is pass out and hope that when he wakes up, none of the last month will have happened. He'll wake up back at home with his boring life and boring job and he's pretty sure he won't mind.

Another waft of air. He sighs and draws himself into a tighter ball.

_Wait a minute._

Air. Not hot air but cool air and it's _moving_.

Hunter looks up. The ceiling is a mish-mash of garbage heap. But right there, in the corner above the energon-coated slab, is a crack.

"Oh no way," he says.

Hunter rolls to his feet. It's not a big crack—he's going to have to move stuff around if he wants to get through—but there's a current flowing through it. He spots a beam lying a few feet in it. Hunter grabs it and pulls. Nothing happens. He wraps both hands around it and gingerly lifts up his feet. It holds. He drops back down. He eyeballs Sideswipe.

* * *

><p>Fort-five minutes. That's how long it takes Hunter to drag himself and Sideswipe through five stories of material squashed into a three-story basement. Forty-five minutes clawing his way through wreckage and melted slag. The last ten feet, water began to drip down on him, slicking his handholds and turning the dust into paste. And still he kept climbing, Sideswipe tethered to him by a length of wire and cable he'd braided together.<p>

Five feet from the surface, Hunter stops. He can hear the sirens, the low thrum of helicopter rotors, a cacophony of voices and diesel engines. He can only imagine what it looks like up there.

"Shit," he says.

He's got to keep going. He's got to get Sideswipe out—somewhere in there he's started making really weird noises, a kind of gurgling and sputtering that Hunter doesn't like. The gray patches on his armor have spread. Hunter can't leave him to go get help. He's going to have to get him top-side, now, and there's no way he's going to do it without being spotted.

_Oh god_, he thinks.

He shimmies his way through the last of it. He can tell the second his fingers break through. Then he's pushing up his arm, pulling the rest of him out. His head breaks the surface.

Into pandemonium. All around him are the jagged remains of concrete and metal and glass. The sky is lit with flashing lights. A swarm of helicopters circle overhead. He counts three fire hoses, all on full blast, dousing the wreckage. Smoke billows out from gaps and holes. The air stinks of electrical fire and burning energon.

No one notices him at first. It's not until he's got his second arm out and is lifting his torso up that the first person screams. He doesn't see who it is—there are too many people swarming the site. He does see when the nearest group of firefighters catches sight of him.

He freezes. So do they. For three seconds, no one does anything.

"Uh," he says.

A cop opens fire. The next thing he knows, people are running and screaming. Bullets slam into his armor. Hunter crouches down and shields his face as best he can. None of the bullets really do any damage—robot armor and all. But Sideswipe isn't going to be so lucky.

Hunter drags his legs out and pulls at the line on his waist. He reaches in and grabs Sideswipe under his arms—he's still got Sunstreaker's head in a death grip. He stays low, angling himself between the people with guns and the wounded Autobot.

Police officers duck down behind their cars. He sees one of them with a shotgun. A helicopter darts overhead.

There's a highway to the north. He's surrounded by industrial buildings. If he can get Sideswipe to one of those, he might be able to hide him, at least until he can find something to drag him off with, a truck or a—

A diesel engine growls. He starts to turn towards it when the black cab of a semi truck plows into the closest cop car. It spins away, the officers ducking to the side. The semi has a large flatbed hooked up to the back. Its tires squeal as it cuts a sharp turn, the trailer sliding out behind it.

_The hell?_

It screeches to a stop. The door opens. A man covered head-to-toe in fine, gray powder leans out and flashes him a startling, white grin.

"What took you so long?" he says.

"_Simmons?_" Hunter says. "What, _how_…?"

Simmons shrugs. "I figured I'd have to haul your ass out of here, so I decided to borrow one of these."

The man seems impervious to the gunfire pinging off his stolen truck. He looks back at the cops and says, "You seem fine, though, so let's pack up your little friend and get the hell outta here, huh?"

Hunter has no time to gawk. He can see the blonde woman, Stephens, in the passenger seat. She's got her gun sticking out of the window and is taking pot shots at the cops.

Sideswipe's armor sparks where rounds hit him. He doesn't stir.

The trailer has no walls. It's an oversized, tow truck bed. Hunter manages to push Sideswipe up, onto it. He finds hooked chains along the sides and straps the 'bot down as best he can.

Helicopters swoop in low, their spotlights dance over him. Hunter ducks back down and shuffles over to the driver's side.

"Where to?" Simmons says.

"Chicago," he says. "I can cover us, just get him out of here, okay?"

"Yeah, yeah," Simmons says. He wrenches the truck into gear. The engine grinds, the exhaust belches black exhaust and it pulls forward. More gunfire slams into it, punches through the windshield.

"Hey!" Hunter says. He stands up and waves his arms. "Over here!"

With spotlights shining off of him and cops shooting at him, with Machination burning behind him, Hunter transforms. Less than minute later, he's a silver Lamborghini facing down a small army of police and fire trucks. Two big, armored trucks—SWAT, maybe—make a beeline for him. He settles himself on his tires and guns it. The back panels on Hunter's frame slide apart. His missile launchers unfold. He takes careful aim and fires. Hot air washes over his roof and hood and the missile streaks overhead and hits the pavement ten feet in front of them. The two vehicles swerve. Hunter plows right between them, through the smoke, skirting the edge of the crater he's just blown into the asphalt.

Then he's clear. He spots Simmons and Sideswipe at the edge of the lot. The helicopters circle like buzzards. He takes off after them.

* * *

><p>Note: this thing will now be updated on Thursdays. Thank you so much to the indefatigable KayDeeBlu for pointing out what I do wrong (and suggesting how I might fix it). And another massive thank you to Starfire201 and lildevchick for your amazingly tenacious support.<p>

Next chapter: Brother


	17. Brother

**Chapter Seventeen: Brother**

Sideswipe hurts. His chest, his spark, everything hurts. He rocks side to side. Wind rushes past. He can hear the low growl of an engine and the roar of wind. Something nags at him. Something is very wrong.

He looks up. His optic won't focus at first. Everything is a dark blur. He can see stars. He's looking at the sky.

_What?_ he thinks.

He's lying on his back on something moving; he can feel the sway beneath him. He knows the sensation of tires on asphalt. He also knows what it feels like to be tied down. His arms don't move. Something holds him, something that rattles. He tries to look but he can't see that far and he's moving and—

Sideswipe bucks. The transport he's lying on rocks; one side of it leaves the ground. Agony rips through him and he doesn't care.

A glint of silver. A familiar shape pulls alongside.

((S-d-sw-p?)) it comms.

He recognizes it. The human, Hunter.

Sideswipe kicks. One of his legs slips free. The transport shakes and swerves. He hears human swearing.

((—no! –ta calm—!))

He needs out! He needs off this thing right now!

Tires squeal. An engine sputters and they begin to slow. Sideswipe thrashes harder.

"Sideswipe!" the human says, out loud this time. "Stop it! You're gonna flip the truck!"

It doesn't matter. All that matters is that they stop, they get him off this thing.

They're moving down, slowing. It's darker here. He's almost got his arm free. His heel flails and then hits the ground. Sparks fly. He doesn't feel it.

"Simmons!" the human says.

The engine grates and the brakes whine.

His bindings loosen. He wriggles his right arm—his left isn't working and he has no time to figure out why. His hand is free. He fumbles with the thing, a chain, feels it unhook, feels it rattle and slither across his frame and then Sideswipe is up, pushing himself off and away—

He hits the ground. His vision flashes as he rolls: dark pavement, green vegetation, dark sky, his armor screeching. He finally stops, lying on his side in the grass.

Transformation cogs whir. Silver armor breaks apart and spins around as Hunter rises to his feet. Sideswipe starts to crawl.

"Sideswipe, calm down, it's okay! We're stopped!"

He makes it a few metras before his one, functioning arm gives out. Sideswipe collapses onto his face, shivering. For a klik, his audios fade out. The world falls silent.

"—swipe? Can you hear me? Shit, I think he's—no, no, I know. I can hear them, too, Simmons."

Hunter is crouched beside him. One of his hands is on Sideswipe's shoulder. Somewhere behind him a door creaks and two, tiny feet hit the pavement.

"What the _hell_ was that? In case you haven't noticed, kid, we've still got the entire Detroit police force out looking for us."

"I _know_. Just… just help me get him back up there."

He can't get back up. His body won't respond. He tries again. Hunter must see something because Sideswipe feels him lean in. The heat of his vents brush along Sideswipe's helm.

"Sideswipe?" he says.

His chest really hurts. A distant pain hovers. He can sense it lurking, waiting, just beyond the cold ache.

_Sunny_.

The planet stops spinning. A beat of silence and then he's consumed in a roar of noise: the distant drone of helicopters, the warbling wail of emergency vehicles, hydraulics in Hunter's legs as he crouches there and the soft breathing of a human nearby. Some kind of insect creaks. Organic plants rustle in the wind. He can feel it beneath him, tickling along his armor and the gaping wound in his chest.

Above it all, one piece of knowledge burns in his mind: his brother isn't here. Sunstreaker isn't here.

"Sunny," he says.

He can _feel_ Hunter still.

He's got to get up. He's got to go. He's got to find him, get him, get Sunstreaker. He drags his arm up, his body screaming at him. His vision blurs.

"Hey, hey," Hunter says. He grabs Sideswipe's shoulder again. "Be careful. You're really chewed up."

"Sunny," Sideswipe says. "Where…?"

Hunter doesn't answer right away. His fingers tighten. Then he says, "Here, let me help."

He carefully rolls Sideswipe onto his back. Even that hurts.

"Jesus," Hunter says. "Your chest… you shouldn't be moving."

His wounds don't matter. Sideswipe shoves the pain away and tries to sit up. Hunter is instantly there, pushing him back down.

"No," he says. "I'm serious. When you move, that shifts around. You're… you're bleeding all over the place."

"Where's Sunny?" Sideswipe says. He can't turn his head much. He can only see the barest sliver of his surroundings: the grass, the trees, a large, black transport. No Sunny. Just the silver imitation.

"Hunter," he says. "Where is Sunstreaker?"

He's on his back, so he can see the way the human flinches, the way he avoids looking at him.

"No," Sideswipe says. "No, no, no."

"I'm sorry," Hunter says. "There was nothing I could do."

_No, no, no. That's not… it can't…no._

As if thinking it makes it true. Because it can't be true. Sunny can't not be there.

"I," the human says. "The building came down. We had to leave. You got… part of him."

Sideswipe's left arm. The human hasn't looked at it once. Sideswipe forces his head up. There's something there, nestled between his arm and his chest. It's too dark and his optic is too slagged to see it very well. He drags his right arm across his chest and brushes torn fingertips along it. A familiar shape catches his eye.

A pointed tip. The bottom half is gone, the edges smooth and melted, but he still recognizes the top half of a stupid, oversized sensor array.

He can't stop the small noise from leaving him.

The face is cracked, a half-slagged mess of ruined metal. The lower jaw is gone, the optics blackened holes. It stinks of burnt ozone and fried wiring. It's still and dark and cold.

Sunny's head is destroyed.

"I'm sorry," Hunter says.

"You left him?" Sideswipe says.

"There wasn't anything to leave. I scanned for him. I did. There wasn't anything else in that wreckage."

Sideswipe wheezes. He clutches his brother's head to his chest.

"How could you leave him?" he says.

Hunter tilts his head down, hiding his optics. "Sideswipe, he was already gone. You were freaking out. If I hadn't gotten you out of there…"

"_Then you should have left me_."

The human's head whips back as if he's been punched.

"Sideswipe—" he says.

"No. You _stupid_ little organic! We have to go back. Take me back!"

For a long moment, the silver fake doesn't move, doesn't respond, just stares.

"I can't," Hunter says.

"The frag you can't! Get up, get me back on that thing. You take me back _right now_."

"Sideswipe, if we do that they'll catch you. There were people all over that place. We barely got away and half the city is looking for us. If you go back they're not gonna ask questions, they're gonna shoot you."

"I don't care. I'm not leaving him."

The human makes a noise as if to speak and stops. He looks back over his shoulder. "I don't think you're thinking clearly. I… I know how hard this is—"

"The slag do you know?" Sideswipe says. "You're some insignificant squishy. You don't know a _thing_."

Even with a rigid face, incapable of making an expression, Hunter's optics seem to burn.

"I know you're being an idiot," he says.

"Do you?"

"Yeah, I do. There wasn't anything you could have done to save him. I _saw_ him before you even got there. He was half-dead then. There wasn't a damn thing you or I or anybody could have done."

"Shut up."

"No."

He trembles. His chest burns, the edges of the incision throb, dull and ugly. He can hear his internals puttering. That doesn't stop him from forcing himself up, onto an elbow.

"Shut up or I'll make you," he says.

The human makes a strange noise. "Have you seen yourself? You wouldn't be able to squash a rat right now."

"Human—"

"_Robot_."

His vision blurs. He fights the violent tremors in his arm and the awful sensation of the edges of his wound grating together.

"I can't leave him," Sideswipe says. "I have to save him."

"You're not gonna save anything going back. You'll only get killed."

"I have to try."

"Sideswipe, he's _gone_."

"No. He's not. I would… I would… I—"

He can't keep it up. His arm collapses and he falls back. A jolt of agony lances through him and the world stops existing. When it comes back it greets Sideswipe with the peculiar sensation of choking on his own fluids.

"—you hear me? _Sideswipe_?"

Hunter's face is centi-metras away.

"Shit. Simmons!"

"What?"

"Get over here!"

"I come up to his thigh, in case you haven't noticed. Gonna be hard to—"

Sideswipe wrenches himself onto his side. Something inside creaks. Something else shifts. Cool liquid trickles out of his chest.

"We've gotta get you back," Hunter says.

Sideswipe doesn't answer. Sunny's head presses into his side. He aches and it's not just his injuries. This is more, this is worse. This is him calling for a presence that isn't going to answer. He's never going to answer because what exists of Sunstreaker is buried under tons of debris and if he isn't dead yet, he will be and Sideswipe can't stop it.

He's failed.

Hunter asks him something. He ignores it. It doesn't matter. All that matters is the lump of metal and the dark thing curled around his spark, the slithering, growing thing inside him that waits to swallow him.

_Let it_, he thinks.

He pulls his legs up. He wants to curl up until there's nothing left. He wants the pain to go away. He wants it to stop, let it all stop. He's too tired. The war, Decepticons, the Headmasters, let all the rage and pain go away. Stop existing.

"Sideswipe?" Hunter says.

Sideswipe can barely hear him. He doesn't move. He can't. If he just lies there the numbness will spread and everything will go away.

"Come on, Sideswipe. Snap out of it."

He's failed. He's come all this way and now it's going to end and there's nothing he can do. Better to lie there and let the cold thing eat him.

"This isn't you," Hunter says.

But it is. It really is. The human just doesn't know it.

"Come on, you can't give up. Not now."

_Can't I?_

It wouldn't be the first time. Oh, he'd kept that his little secret. It was easy enough to bitch and gripe and pass the blame along but it had been his burden to bear and he's never forgotten that. And now…

"'S my fault," he says.

"No it not," Hunter says.

"It is."

"They had a hundred people there. You couldn't—"

"Not Machination. _Me_. I'm the reason Sunny was here. 'S _my_ fault. I wanted him gone."

"Sideswipe—"

"Everything was messed up," Sideswipe says. "_Sunny _was messed up. He was a 'con, before, did you know that? But even they couldn't stand him. Afterward… after we got him back, I thought I could make it better. I'd fix him; we'd be like we used to be. And the more I tried, the worse he got and I was so _sick_ of it.

"Everywhere we went, everything we did. He was always on guard, always looking for a fight. He didn't get along with anyone—not even me. Not anymore. And it just… I wanted it to end."

A truck whooshes on the road. Hunter doesn't say anything, doesn't move. Even Simmons has stopped fidgeting.

"You know what I thought when I'd heard he'd been taken? The first thing that came to my mind? I thought, 'Finally. Maybe someone'll teach him a lesson.' What kind of brother does that?"

"Sideswipe," Hunter says, his voice hushed, "no one's perfect. I… I only knew him for a few weeks and even I could tell he was a difficult guy. No one can blame you for wanting a break. I… everyone cracks."

"I wanted him gone," Sideswipe says. "I let them take him. I let them reassign him, away from me. I didn't even try to fight it. I should have. I should have been there, should have protected him."

Sideswipe shivers. His armor rattles.

"Sunny didn't have anyone," he says. "No one wanted anything to do with him. It was _my_ job, he was _my_ responsibility. We're twins; he's _part_ of me. And I abandoned him. When he needed me most, I wasn't there. I left him to rust and no one came to help him except you. I was too late."

"It's not your fault," Hunter says.

"Isn't it? If I hadn't let him leave then he wouldn't have come here. None of this would have happened."

There's a long pause. Bugs chirp. Then, in an almost timid voice, Hunter says, "But Machination would still be here. And I'm not… I'm not saying that I'm glad. I wish they hadn't caught anyone. But if it hadn't been him, if he didn't have you, then I wouldn't be here talking to you, I'd be pieces in a lab somewhere. And maybe no one would have stopped them. Maybe they'd have their army. And, Christ, I'm sorry. I messed up, too. I told him, I promised him that I'd get help, get him out of there."

Sideswipe can't stop the hysterical giggle from spilling out. "I guess that means we're both losers, huh?"

"Please, Sideswipe, please don't give up now. If you do then the only other person I've got is some psycho with a badge—"

"Thank you," Simmons says.

"You can't leave me with him."

His fingers curl around his twin's head. That small movement is exhausting. Hunter kneels next to him. Flickering neon light reflects off his armor.

"Please," he says. "I know this is hard. I do. But if you give up now, it's over. They win."

He's trying to help. Sideswipe knows this. Hunter had dragged his aft out of that building and that was _after_ Sideswipe had ditched him. He's got scuff marks and scratches, a series of indentations on his face that Sideswipe knows match his own fingers. The human hadn't gotten him out of there easily.

He doesn't know it, and Sideswipe will never tell him, but right then, at this moment, he reminds Sideswipe of his brother so much that it actually hurts.

The searing cold in his chest gives a dull spike. Sideswipe flinches. The bond is still there, choked with hurts, new and old—a rotted connection. He could open it all the way, let it in, let it consume him. He's heard of backlash before, the severing of a bond whipping back and engulfing a 'bot's mind, burning out the spark. It's not a quick way to go.

"Sideswipe," Hunter says.

It'd be easy. So easy. Open it up, let him feel Sunny's death in the moments before it destroyed him, too. But in that small moment Sideswipe would be there. They'd be connected again.

_Sunstreaker._

A door creaks open. Feet hit the pavement and he catches a slight, alien groan. A rustle and a clang as something else hits the ground.

"Agent Simmons," a human says. Its voice is pitched higher, a female.

"Hey, _hey!_" Simmons says. Scurrying footsteps and another rattle. "Be careful with that!"

"For the love of_ god_," Hunter snarls. "Really? You're gonna do this now?"

"Agent Simmons," the woman says.

"Look at this!" Simmons says. "You put a dent in it!"

"Christ's sake, Simmons!"

Heavier footsteps pound through the turf as Hunter stomps away. Sideswipe finds himself staring at the night sky all alone. Sunny's head presses into him, cold. He turns his head.

A human female leans against the side of the transport. She's got an arm wrapped around her middle. Her skin is pale. Simmons stands a metra away from her with a silver canister held in both hands. Hunter looms over him.

"It's not my fault that thing's in the way," the woman says. "Listen—"

"This," Simmons says, shaking the canister at her, "is federal property. You can't go tossing it around."

"Agent Simmons—"

"Because if it gets damaged—"

Which is when Hunter leans over and plucks it from his arms.

"Hey!"

"Now is _not_ the time for this," Hunter says.

"Thank you," the woman says.

"Do not take that tone with me, young man."

The agent starts babbling something about "felonies" and "prison time." It's getting harder for Sideswipe to focus. The woman rubs a hand over her face. Simmons points at Hunter and then at what he's holding. Sideswipe has to squint see it.

It's nothing special, just a metal canister about as wide as a human. It's coated in a layer of fine, gray dust. Two handles are welded onto it, one on each side, and the lid is held down by four latches. Nothing special at all until he feels the tug.

_What?_

Through the clawing pain and sheer exhaustion, on the verge of shut down, a ghost brushes his mind.

_No._

Hunter looks over. He catches Sideswipe staring and says, "Sideswipe? What's wrong?"

_No. It's not possible. That can't…_

"Can I see that?" he finds himself saying.

Hunter looks at the canister and then starts towards him. Simmons trots along after him.

"Hey!" Simmons says. "What part of 'federal property' didn't you understand? You can't—"

Hunter kicks the ground and sprays the man with clods of dirt. Simmons twists away, sputtering.

"Oh yeah, kid," he says. "Real mature."

Hunter ignores him. He kneels next to Sideswipe and holds out the canister.

So close, the sensation is stronger; a tug on his spark, the faintest physical pulling. Sideswipe lifts his hand, dimly noting that his fingers tremble, and touches it. The reaction is instantaneous.

There's a bright flash. A jolt races up his arm. Hunter yelps and almost drops it.

"Whoa!" he says. "What the hell?"

Sideswipe stares. His audios glitch. He can't hear through the high-pitched ringing. Within his chest, his spark seems to buzz. He grabs bottom of the canister. It fits into his palm. Hunter lets go and Sideswipe sets it on the grass.

"What is it?" Hunter says.

Sideswipe can't answer. He's too busy trying to pry off the lid, clasping with fingers that don't want to work anymore. Hunter doesn't offer to help. He doesn't say anything, he just sits there and watches and waits.

After a few, agonizing nano-kliks, Sideswipe flips the last latch. Freezing gas hisses from the seams. Sideswipe pulls the lid up, revealing a smaller canister inside. He reaches in and lifts it out.

Held within a cylindrical cage of padded bars is a mottled, dark gray sphere. The surface is dull and flaking, criss-crossed with thin, silver lines. It looks brittle. It looks dead.

"What is that?" Hunter says.

The ground tilts under him. The ringing grows deafening. His spark feels like it's going to vibrate right out of his chest.

"It's Sunstreaker," he says.

Half a klik of silence. Hunter says, "What."

"It's his spark. Sunny's spark. It's still in there, he's alive."

It's Sunny.

Sideswipe has found Sunstreaker.

* * *

><p>Short chapter, I know, but it was important, right? Thank you KayDeeBlu and Starfire201 and lildevchick. And thanks to the people who have added this to their alerts and favorites.<p>

Next chapter: Trust Me


	18. Trust Me

**Chapter Eighteen: Trust Me**

"Do these things cry?" Simmons says.

Hunter glares. Simmons doesn't even look up; he stares at Sideswipe and Hunter can't really blame him. The Autobot himself stares at the small, metal sphere with an expression Hunter can't even begin to decipher.

_We shouldn't be seeing this_, he thinks.

It's too personal. He feels like a voyeur, watching the raw emotion on Sideswipe's battered face. The way he's holding the spark container… Hunter is intruding on something he's not meant to see.

"Simmons," he says as quietly as he can. The agent tears his gaze away. Hunter nods to the truck. To his credit, the man nods and turns without a word. Hunter starts to follow.

"Thank you."

The words are so soft that Hunter isn't even sure he heard it. He stops and turns and finds Sideswipe looking at him.

"Oh," Hunter says. "No, Simmons was the one to grab…" he's not sure whether to say "him" or "that" or "it."

"Then thank you both," Sideswipe says.

Simmons stops next to Hunter. He studies the Autobot for a moment and then sighs.

"Egh, fine," he says. "You can keep it. Wouldn't do me much good, anyway."

Inside the shell, Hunter's jaw drops. But Sideswipe lets out one of the odd, chuffing rumbles that Hunter thinks might be laughter.

"No," Sideswipe says. "Sunny's a real pain in the aft."

"Yeah, well, better you than me, pal."

Simmons starts back toward the truck. Hunter watches him go and then says, "So he's really in there?"

It's hard to tell through all the damage, but he thinks Sideswipe smiles.

"Yeah," he says.

Hunter has never seen a spark container. Patches of dark gray cover a lighter, more reflective surface. The dark splotches are the exact color as the gray parts on Sideswipe's armor. He can't help but think that the slightest touch will make it crumble.

"Is it supposed to look like that?" he says.

"No," Sideswipe says. "It's… Sunny's really weak right now. He's alive, but we need to get him back to the ship."

"Yeah," Hunter says. He has no idea how bad it must look to Sideswipe, who _knows_ what he's looking at. "He's not gonna, you know…?"

Sideswipe pauses. Then, "We need to hurry."

"Got it."

"Once we get back to the ship, you're gonna need—" Sideswipe stops. His eye moves, looking past Hunter. Hunter turns to find Simmons storming over with Stephens not far behind.

"What?" Hunter says.

"The quiet," Sideswipe says. He's tilted his head to stare toward the highway.

The engine of the semi ticks as it cools. Crickets chirp. Cicadas hum. The fluorescent lights over the rest area bathrooms buzz. What Hunter doesn't hear, what he realizes he hasn't heard in a few minutes, is traffic. The highway is dark and silent. The drumming of helicopters has vanished.

"Kid," Simmons says, trotting the last few feet. "Hey, I need you to listen up for a second."

"What's going on?" Hunter says.

Simmons lifts both his hands in a placating gesture. "Calm down. I got everything under control, alright? Just promise me you're gonna listen to what I say before you go flying off the handle—"

"What did you do now?"

"Like that," Simmons says. "Take a deep breath and can it, okay? Let me explain."

_Explain?_

He's already on his feet, head swiveling, scanning for whatever—

_Oh god, no._

Two blips on the visor. They're maybe a hundred feet in the air and closing in fast. And there are more on the ground, in both directions on the highway. He picks up the distinct signature of energy weapons.

"Simmons, what the hell?" he says.

"It's alright," Simmons says. "These are my people, okay?"

"Okay? This is not okay! What the—how the _hell_ did they—"

Simmons stands there. He doesn't look surprised or anything, just kind of nervous.

"_You_," Hunter says.

"_Listen_," Simmons says. "Both of you. I can get the both of you out of here and back to your ship but you have got to trust me, alright? You're gonna have to do what I say, when I say it."

Hunter's right hand twitches. The machinery is there; he could be armed and shooting in less than two seconds. The moment the thought flashes through his mind, Simmons looks at him.

"Kid, the entire country is looking for you. And I'm not talking about the media vultures. Right now, the Pentagon is scrambling fighters to come after you. They've got high-altitude drones scouring the city to find you. There is no way in hell you or Red are going to make it to your ship without someone spotting you. Not on your own. Do you understand?"

"So what, we let you haul us off to some government lab?"

"We've got a small window of opportunity here," Simmons says. "The bureaucrats are too busy squabbling over whose jurisdiction is entitled to what. If we can get you to where you need to go before they decide on anything…"

"While the politicians argue, you sneak off with the prize," Hunter says.

Simmons shrugs.

"Who the hell are you, Simmons?" Hunter says.

"You're running out of time," Simmons says.

Hunter can hear helicopters. Three of them. Headlights appear on the horizon.

_Shit_, he thinks.

((Sideswipe?)) he comms.

A crackle. Then Sideswipe says, ((Yeah.))

((What do you want to do?))

Sunstreaker's spark container is dying. Sunstreaker is dying. Sideswipe can barely move, let alone fight his way the two-hundred-fifty miles to the ship and Hunter's not sure he can hold off the entire army.

((Frag,)) Sideswipe says. ((I don't think we've got much of a choice.))

Simmons watches them, his face unreadable. Stephens slowly lowers herself to the ground. She's pale. He can see dark circles under eyes. Behind him, Sideswipes insides gurgle in a way he really doesn't like.

"Shit," he says.

Simmons grins.

"Let's get one thing straight," Hunter says. "If it looks, even for a second, like you're gonna double cross us, I swear to god I will end you."

"Yeah yeah," Simmons says. "You know, kid, for being such a moralist, you resort to violence pretty quickly."

Hunter clenches his jaw. He looks to Sideswipe. Then he says, "What do we do?"

* * *

><p>Three helicopters are inbound. He's got a ground team on the way, coming from the east and the west on highway ninety-four. Simmons has minutes until the first wave reaches them.<p>

"I need both of you to promise me that you will not fight back," Simmons says. "I mean it. The first sign of hostility and I'm not going to be able to stop my team from taking you down. We clear?"

He can _see_ the hostility rippling in the air above the two NBE's. The kid looks like he's about four seconds from tearing across the landscape and opening fire.

"Kid," he says.

Two very long seconds tick by. Finally, the kid lets out a growling sigh. He visibly forces himself to relax.

The sound of helicopter rotors thump in the distance. Simmons can see their spotlights waving above the trees. Simmons looks from the sky to the kid and to Red.

"Okay," he says. "Red, you stay right where you are. Kid, I need you on the ground, hands on the back of your head. And I mean right now."

Hunter grumbles under his breath and starts to lower himself to the ground. Simmons watches him for a moment and switches his attention to the sky. The first helicopter roars over head. The wind blasts the trees. His clothes flap around him. Then it's gone, banking to the left to circle around. Another one comes in, this one slower. Simmons is forced to shield his face with one hand as the backwash kicks up dirt and loose gravel. He lifts one arm and waves.

"Simmons!" Red says. He's got that metal ball tucked practically into the incision in his chest.

"Stay cool!" Simmons shouts over the incredible noise. "Don't move!"

The third helicopter comes to a stop hovering at the edge of the rest area. He watches as lines drop out, as armored agents begin to rope down. A flurry of movement towards the road as four SUV's screech to a stop, doors flinging open, more agents spilling out. The first chopper comes around and stops, hovering, facing them, and Simmons knows that the door guns are trained right on their clearing. One wrong move and they'll open fire and while it may not outright kill either NBE, he and Stephens will be blown to steaming pieces of meat.

"Hunter, keep your head down!" Simmons says.

The kid peeks up. He shoots a glance at Simmons and then lowers his face into the grass.

His people swarm down the rise, toward them. Simmons steps forward, still waving. The helicopter agents fan out, surrounding the kid and Red. Simmons spots one of them with a cryogenic tank.

"Hey!" he says. "Hey!"

The SUV group breaks up, most of them joining the ring forming around the downed NBE's. Another, smaller group hustles over to him.

"Agent Simmons!" someone says.

_I know that voice_, he thinks.

"Cantrell!" he says.

Agent Liz Cantrell, her short brown hair hidden under a helmet, steps forward. She stays down; they all do. She reaches out her hand to him but he ignores it, leaning in close.

"I need you to tell your team to back off!" he says.

"What?"

"Back off! Do not engage! They're friendlies!"

Her brows furrow.

"I'm sorry, I can't do that!" she says.

Any second now someone is going to do something stupid. Someone is going to open fire or his team is going to start hosing Hunter and Red down. And when they do, promises or no, he doubts they'll lay there and take it.

"Cantrell! I need you to listen to me! I will explain everything in a minute but right now, I need you to tell your team to stand down before things get ugly!"

She looks at him for a long moment. She could very well ignore him. Red is in no condition to defend himself. The kid will never be able to drag him out alone. One way or another, they'll be taken down. He's in no position to issue orders. He knows he looks like shit, he knows procedure. In their shoes, he'd have both NBE's tagged and bagged and on ice in a truck in a heartbeat. And he can see that she's thinking it.

"They're helping us," he says. "They have information. Something big is going on and those two are our best chance at stopping it. So unless you feel like handing civilization itself over to an incoming alien invasion, I suggest you stand down."

Cantrell stares for a few seconds. Then she lifts her wrist and shouts, "All units, hold your fire! Repeat: all units, do _not_ fire. Stand down!"

"Thank you," Simmons says.

Cantrell nods. She turns and makes a whirling gesture at the helicopters. Simmons is careful not to let his relief show.

* * *

><p>Agents in dark body armor swarm all over the clearing. Hunter stays right where he is, lying on his belly on the grass, Sideswipe next to him. The helicopters circle a few hundred feet away. Simmons is in some kind of intense, huddled discussion with other, armored agents. Hunter sees the glow of a cell phone being passed around.<p>

((Sideswipe,)) he says. ((Is Sunstreaker still okay?))

((Yeah,)) Sideswipe says. ((What the frag is taking them so long?))

They've been there for fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes on the ground with his hands behind his head, with twelve guys with very big guns and very twitchy fingers standing over him.

There are four SUV's next to the grass. In addition to the twelve guys around him, there are nine more by Sideswipe, another five next to Simmons, and one guy standing with Stephens. If something goes wrong, if one of them starts to shoot, Hunter can be up in half a second. One missile to each car and a few to spare for the helicopters. The trouble would be getting Sideswipe. The stolen truck is still right there, but Hunter would need someone to drive it—

Simmons breaks away from the cluster. He comes sauntering over and crouches next to Hunter's head.

"Okay kid," he says. "I've talked to my superiors and they agree that you're a better asset alive and in one piece."

"Oh, goodie," Hunter says.

"They've agreed to let this team escort you back to your ship where you can get Red and the silver ball patched up."

"And in exchange?" Sideswipe says.

Simmons mouth pulls into a faint smirk.

"In exchange for cooperation," he says.

"What kind of cooperation?" Hunter says.

Simmons shrugs. "We don't know enough to make that assessment just yet."

"So we'll owe you," Sideswipe says. "Are your superiors looking for a favor, or looking for weapons? Because _my_ superiors aren't going to hand over any of our technology, no matter what kind of agreement I make."

"I'm sure we can all work something out."

"Oh yeah, this is gonna turn out great," Hunter says.

"Okay, young man," Simmons says. "I just saved your ass. Both of you. Is it too much to ask that you keep the sarcasm to a minimal? I know it's hard, but could you try?"

Hunter rolls his eyes. "Fine. Can I get up now?"

"Yeah. Give me a minute to warn everyone, alright?" Simmons stands and heads back toward the smaller group of agents.

* * *

><p>He has Sunny. He's right there, right with him, weakened but still so alive. Sideswipe's body is light. He holds his brother's spark container as close to him as he can, sheltering it as best he can. The humans have managed to rig up a cover over him. A stiff, blue cloth Hunter had called a "tarp" is draped over his frame and secured to the sides of the trailer bed. Every time he moves it rustles. The wind sneaks in through the gaps the edges.<p>

He doesn't mind. Because he has Sunny.

((Sideswipe?))

And Hunter. The human who, despite everything, had hauled Sideswipe's aft out of a burning building. The human who had helped get Sunny's spark out.

((Sideswipe? You awake?))

((Yeah,)) he comms.

((Oh,)) Hunter says. ((Just making sure you're, you know. How are you holding up? Aside from the obvious.))

The truck sways back and forth. The trailer rattles. He's lost too much energon. He doesn't have the energy to lift his legs anymore. The gash in his chest throbs and burns. He can feel air where there shouldn't be any.

((Peachy,)) he says.

((Sunstreaker?))

This takes longer.

((Still here,)) he says.

Hunter doesn't say anything else for a few minutes. Sideswipe listens to the tires on the road, to the creaking of the trailer, to the engine of the transport and the cars in front and behind them. He listens to his own insides shift around.

_You'll be okay, Sunshine,_ he thinks. _You're too much of a mean fragger to go and die now and I'm too much of a slag-head to let you._

Sunny gives no response.

((Do you…)) Hunter says. Sideswipe waits for him to finish only he doesn't.

((Do I what?)) he says.

((Why hasn't Machination attacked us, yet?))

((Their base was pretty fragged. It'll probably be a while before they can get their slag together.))

((Oh.))

((Nice job, by the way. What'd you do? Blow an armory?))

((Me and Simmons found where they stored the energon. We set it on fire.))

Sideswipe tries to piece these words together in a way that makes logical sense. He fails.

((Come again?)) he says.

((The energon,)) Hunter says. ((They were keeping all these cubes down in the lower basement. We sloshed it all over the room and set it on fire and ran like hell. I woke up in an elevator shaft with a nasty headache.))

((You set energon on fire,)) Sideswipe says.

((Yeah.))

((A lot of it.))

((Yeah?))

((All at once? With you inside the building?))

((Where are you going with this?))

((Hunter, energon is really unstable.))

((Hence the giant explosion and the building collapse.))

Sideswipe spends the next minute trying to find a polite way to phrase the question, "Are you glitched?"

((Are you glitched?)) he finally says.

((We didn't know it would be that bad,)) Hunter says.

And yet they did it anyway. A bunch of organics, setting energon on fire just because it sounded like a good idea.

He wonders if the Decepticons know what they're getting into.

((And anyway, it worked, right?)) Hunter says.

((You're lucky you aren't dead,)) Sideswipe says. ((You're lucky _I'm_ not dead.))

((Well, what else was I supposed to do? It was just me and Simmons against an entire building of people with guns and bazookas and crap. Where were _you_ during all of this?))

_Getting my aft handed to me_, he thinks. A faint brush against his mind. Sideswipe looks at the spark case. _Sunny?_

((I got caught,)) Sideswipe says.

((That scorpion thing,)) Hunter says.

((Yeah,)) Sideswipe says. ((Goes by the name Scorpinok.))

((I met him. Before. Only it was just his head. How did…he's a Headmaster, isn't he?))

Silence. Hunter swears.

((Is that what this whole thing was about? He needed someone to experiment on? Is that why he took me? Why he…))

((I don't know,)) Sideswipe says.

((But then why would he make so many copies of Sunstreaker? If he was going to do that to himself… I saw what it did to Sunstreaker. Why the hell would anyone do that to themselves? Why would he need to?))

Sideswipe lays there. Sunny's spark gives off a small flare of energy.

((Shit, I'm sorry,)) Hunter says. ((I didn't mean—))

((It's okay,)) Sideswipe says.

_I've got you, Sunny. You're safe._

((You don't think he died back there, do you?)) Hunter says.

((I don't think we're that lucky.))

((So what happens when he comes after us?))

Sideswipe knows what he needs to do. He's known it for a while. By doing it, he will save Sunstreaker. By doing it, he will doom himself.

((We're calling for back-up,)) he says.

* * *

><p>Backup. Other Autobots.<p>

On one hand, this makes Hunter feel better—more Autobots means less chance of Sideswipe and him being slaughtered if or when Scorpinok shows up. It means he might be able to find out what happened to Verity and Jimmy. Might even get to see them again.

On the other hand…

_I'm a cyborg freak walking around in a cloned body of one of their people who was tortured and hacked apart. Oh yeah. They're gonna love that._

And for what? Because Scorpinok needed a guinea pig. He needed someone to test his process on. Needed to make sure it would work before doing it to himself.

_Someone is his Headmaster. Someone worked with him._

Scorpinok made an army. And Hunter has no idea why.

Sideswipe falls silent. Hunter doesn't bug him again. To the east, the sky begins to change color, fading to a deep blue as dawn approaches. Birds chirp. It's light enough for him to see the outline of the treetops beyond the reach of his own headlights.

They're the only cars on the road. Hunter assumes they have Simmons to thank for that. Every couple of minutes he catches the drone of helicopters in the distance.

It's been the longest stretch of time in the last three days that someone hasn't been trying to kill him.

Out in front, the lead vehicle makes a right turn, off the road, and onto an unmarked, dirt path. There are no lights. Branches scrape his frame on both sides. The truck carrying Sideswipe has to slow way down. The air smells of dampness and rotted leaves.

A few minutes later and they're through.

Hunter has never seen where Sideswipe had stashed his ship, not in daylight, anyway. When he'd been brought in, he'd been unconscious. When he left, it had been too dark to see anything but the sand dunes and the trees.

His first sight is water. Hunter knows lakes; he grew up in Oklahoma. He's been on lakes that twist and turn and go on for miles. That is nothing compared to Lake Michigan. Lake Michigan isn't a lake, it's an _ocean_. It's just water, as far as he can see, inky blackness going on and on and merging with the sky.

"Whoa," he says.

A gust of wind sweeps in and rocks him on his tires. He smells the cool moisture in the air. They keep going, his tires sinking into the sand. Finally, about twenty feet from the mild surf, the convoy stops. Doors open. Armed agents drop out and take up positions around the vehicles.

Simmons comes striding up, a black jacket flapping in the breeze, radio in one hand. He walks with a limp.

"You okay?" Hunter says.

Simmons nods.

"How about you?" he says. "Hey Red, you still alive?"

Sideswipe makes a strange noise that Hunter recognizes as a curse. Then, "Hurry up and get me off this thing."

"I will as soon as you tell me where this ship of yours is. 'Cause I'm not seeing it."

"It's underwater," Hunter says.

"Like…" Simmons gestures to the waves hissing along the beach. "Out there?"

Simmons stares at the shape under the tarp. He looks at the water. He looks at Hunter. "How the hell do you plan on getting it?"

((Hunter,)) Sideswipe comms, ((I'm too fragged to get up and I won't risk 'jumping Sunny. You're going to have to go down there and bring the ship up to the shore.))

((Wait, what? You can't, I don't know, remote fly the thing?))

((I can walk you right through it. It'll be fine.))

((Sideswipe…))

((Come on, you've done worse.))

"Hello?" Simmons says. "Someone gonna answer me?"

"Hang on," Hunter says. "I'm gonna transform. Can you make sure no one freaks out and shoots me or anything?"

He barely has to think about it, now. Seconds later he picks himself up onto two legs. Presto, instant robot. And the heart rate of every single human—except one—in the vicinity sky rockets. He kneels next to Simmons.

"I've gotta go in there," he says, pointing to the water. "I'll get the ship and fly it up here."

"Are you qualified for that?" Simmons says.

_No_, he thinks.

"Sideswipe's gonna be monitoring me," he says. "He says it's practically on autopilot."

Simmons stares at him for exactly four seconds. Then he lifts his radio and says, "All units, back to vehicles. Repeat: all units, get back to your vehicles. Get _off_ the beach."

Sideswipe starts to laugh.

((Shut up, Sideswipe,)) Hunter says. ((Let's just get this over with.))

((You're going to have to come over here.))

Simmons scurries back to his own SUV along with the rest of his agents. The engine of the semi coughs to life. Hunter leans down to peer through the driver's window.

"Hey, could you hold on a minute?" he says.

The two men inside go pale. The driver nods. Hunter moves to the back.

((I'm here,)) he says.

((You're going to have to get this thing off of me,)) Sideswipe says.

Hunter rolls his eyes. The clasps are too small for him to undo. Another quick word with the driver and both agents get outside and start to pull the tarp away.

The sun thinks about rising. The waves, at first a deep black, turn gray. It's still too dark to pick out details, but it's not dark enough to hide all the damage to Sideswipe. Hunter has seen it before, of course: the mess of mangled metal in the gloom of that stinking hole and later, under the green of the fluorescent lights at the rest area. In the dim, gray of pre-dawn, it's somehow worse.

"Jesus," he says.

Sideswipe is leaking. There are smears all underneath him. The 'bot lies on his back with what's left of Sunstreaker's head in the crook of his ruined left arm. The right holds Sunstreaker's spark container against his chest, tucked beneath his chin.

"That bad, huh?" Sideswipe says. He makes a buzzing noise that Hunter can't identify and crooks a finger in a "come here" gesture. Hunter leans in.

"You know that interface I did with you?" he says. "When I went into your memories?"

"Yeah?" Hunter says, his non-existent stomach churning.

"We're gonna have to do that again."

Hunter jerks back. "What? _Why_?"

"Because it'll take me a lot longer to explain what you need to do and we don't have that kind of time."

"But…"

The rattle in the 'bot's chest has turned into a rough grind. Hunter can only see a small curve of Sunstreaker's spark container, but he thinks the dark patches have spread. His gaze falls on the charred head lying on the other arm.

"Goddamnit," he says. "What do I do?"

"You need to format your hand into a jack," Sideswipe says. "It's a subroutine of the transformation command. You should have it."

_Lots of things I should have and a robot body isn't one of them_, he thinks. He finds the code. His right arm whirs and his fingers sort of fold back as a weird, tri-cornered headphone jack assembles where his palm meets his wrist.

"There you go," Sideswipe says. "There's a port on the back of my head, right beneath the helm. Just plug in and I can transfer the files over to you."

He makes it sound so easy. Hunter remembers, though, what it felt like to have Sideswipe digging through his head.

"Is this going to hurt?" he says.

An expression crosses Sideswipe's face too fast for Hunter to identify.

"It shouldn't be as bad," Sideswipe says. "I've got them ready to go. It won't take long."

Hunter wonders if that look had been Sideswipe-ese for "lying through my robot teeth."

He sighs. "Let's do this."

Sideswipe twists his head to the side. Hunter squints. There, hidden halfway under the thick, black plating that covers his head, is a silver disc about the size of his thumb. He can make out a slot in the center of it. He looks at his wrist.

_There is no way for this not to be weird._

The wind gusts. Sideswipe's guts let out another coughing grumble. Seconds tick by.

"Problem?" Sideswipe says.

"No. I just…"

"Come on, Hunter. You need to hurry."

Hunter lifts his hand. He lines the jack up and hesitates. Even torn up and barely able to move, Sideswipe still radiates an air of… it's not menace. It's nothing so sinister. It's something alien. Something old and strange.

"Hunter—"

He plugs in.

The world drops away in a rush and time slows and stops and he doesn't even know who he is anymore. Around him is something vast and it's_ moving_. Shimmering lines weave into intricate patterns around jigsaw pieces and it's old; it's so old. Here and there are patches of grating, ugly _rot_. It hurts to see those. He wants to make it stop, make them go away, replace them with the glowing strands and—

Something hits him. He staggers, falls—

He opens his eyes. His cheeks are wet.

"—er!"

"NBE is down, repeat—"

A radio squawks.

He's staring at a dirty tire. One arm is pinned beneath him. His legs are all twisted up. He's on the ground. He hears feet moving around him.

"Hunter?" the faint buzz beneath the voice marks it as Sideswipe.

Names. He knows names. He knows the faces they're attached to. And the one everyone keeps saying: Hunter. He knows that one, too. He's heard it a lot.

Brakes squeal. A door opens and more feet bite into the sand. The swish of pants; someone walking, fast.

"Kid? Hey, kid?" Simmons says. He bends down to look into his eyes. Then he lifts back up and his head disappears from sight. "What the hell did you do?"

"I didn't do anything," Sideswipe says. "Give him a klik. He'll snap out of it."

"Snap out of what? You listen to me, pal, if you—"

"It was a memory transfer. He's a little disoriented—"

"You call _that_ disoriented? He dropped like a goddamn dead elephant."

Hunter. It's his name. He's Hunter.

"Ow," he says.

The bickering cuts off. He lifts his head, finds the two agents from the truck standing over him. Sideswipe has managed to lever himself up to peer over the edge of the trailer. As soon as Hunter makes eye contact, he gives a half-smile and flops back down.

Hunter smells something burning. His forehead hurts. He lifts a hand and feels a dent in his helmet.

"What happened?" he says.

"You and Dumbo there—" Simmons says.

"Hey!" Sideswipe says.

"—did some sort of weird, robot thing, and then you collapsed. You cracked your head pretty good on the way down. You alright?"

His skull pounds. His face tingles. A terrible emptiness echoes through him.

_Is that…?_ he thinks. He looks at the trailer.

"Yeah," he says. "I'm fine."

_Jesus, Sideswipe, is that what you've been carrying around all this time?_

He pushes himself up into a sitting position only to find Sideswipe staring at him. Sunstreaker. That awful, crawling emptiness is Sideswipe's connection to Sunstreaker. Sideswipe doesn't say anything. Neither does Hunter.

"Are we doing this or not?" Simmons says.

* * *

><p>Sorry about that delay. Work got crazy.<p>

Next chapter: The Hard Part


	19. The Hard Part

**Chapter Nineteen: The Hard Part**

Walking underwater is the weirdest thing Hunter's ever done. Considering the last few weeks of his life, that says something. He knows the water is fifty-four degrees. He knows he's seventy-three feet down. He feels none of these things, not the temperature, not his ears popping, nothing.

It's hard to move. The bottom of the lake is soft silt. Each step sinks his foot in up to the ankle. He has to take it slow, make sure he doesn't fall over because wallowing around in the muck, trying to get back to his feet on the bottom of a lake when he's a three-ton robot is not fun.

_Stupid Sideswipe_, he thinks. _Why'd he have to park so far from shore?_

He doesn't remember the trek being this long last time.

He can't see anything. The sun isn't up and he's too far down and he's kicking up so much mud that the water has turned to soup. He can't even cut through it with headlights.

There's surprisingly little garbage down there. He's run into the occasional soda can or beer bottle and he's stepped on a few tires and a couple of logs and one, lone shopping cart.

((How's it going?)) Sideswipe comms.

((I'm almost there,)) Hunter says.

((Good. What do you do once you're in?))

Hunter rolls his eyes. ((Head to the right, to the bridge. Find a console, plug in, and hope it doesn't fry my brain.))

((It won't,)) Sideswipe says. ((The ship isn't a mech. The programming is different.))

The shimmering lines and puzzle pieces, all shifting and moving around… that had been Sideswipe's mind. That had been a mech's mind. Hunter still can't make any sense out of it.

The data files, however, are much easier, what Sideswipe had passed along during their mind meld. It's a movie Hunter can start or stop, pause or rewind. He can watch himself—with Sideswipe's hands—connect to the ship.

A low vibration hums through the water thrums along the surface of his armor. He can feel it in his teeth. Silt swirls and he catches a glimpse of dirty yellow and then he's there, standing right next to it. The ship is huge. Even with his lights on, the edges curve away into darkness. He reaches up and places a hand on the hull. It's warm.

((I'm there,)) Hunter comms.

((Do you see the hatch?)) Sideswipe says.

It's to his left and down, sunken three or four feet into the mud.

((It's buried,)) he says.

((Doesn't matter. The airlock will scrub everything out.))

There's a panel to the side, about the size of his hand. He leans down and pushes it. The hatch slides in and pulls open. Water rushes in. The ground slips out from beneath his feet. Hunter tumbles in after it.

"Aah!" he says.

He hits something and bounces. The water and mud churn together and he can't see anything. His right hand brushes something hard—the floor, a wall, he doesn't know. Then he slams into it, skids for a second, and stops.

The ship gives off a low, grinding noise. The whole room shakes in a deep, pulsating rumble.

His head breaks the surface. He's lying flat on his back in a few feet of water, getting shallower by the second. Hunter sits up, looks down at himself, and groans.

He's covered head to foot in a grimy coat of lake muck. Something in his chest makes a wet, sputtering noise and then he's hit with the smell: the dank, mustiness of soggy decay.

"Oh _gross_," he says.

And then the overhead sprinklers come on.

* * *

><p>Hunter remembers this place. Three, maybe four days ago he'd been standing on one of the three consoles dotting the room. He'd just been shot, had his brain hacked, and his arm broken. He'd stood there and watched one skyscraper smolder, watched reporters with perfect hair and perfect makeup and perfect, unwrinkled clothes report that eight—then ten—people were dead and that it was his fault.<p>

Four days ago, ten people had been a disaster. Four days ago, ten people had left him feeling sick and small and empty.

Four days ago was another lifetime. Now, he just feels tired.

He steps into the room. The lights come on automatically. He picks the console to the right and walks over.

((Hey Sideswipe,)) he says. ((You'd better be right with this thing, 'cause if my brain melts, you're screwed.))

((You'll be fine,)) Sideswipe says.

Hunter plugs in. At first, there's nothing. He stands there, feeling awkward and a little stupid with his hand stuck into the thing. But then a light on the side of the panel flickers. A soft hum travels up the column and into his hand. The monitor in front of him glows a soft blue around the edges. Suddenly, he's not alone in his head.

It's not like Sideswipe. It's similar—the same, vibrant, shimmering lines threading through massive, asymmetrical puzzle pieces. But while Sideswipe had been _right there_, all around and consuming, the ship holds itself back. It floats around him, not through him.

"Okay," he says and pulls up Sideswipe's memory.

It's tricky keeping that in his head with the ship all around. It's like rubbing his stomach and patting his head all while hopping on one foot. He has to think about what he's doing, has to pay attention to where his mind is going.

There: a green line brighter than the others. Hunter reaches in and plucks at it. Some of the knobby gears behind it shift. A deep thrum races through the floor. The whole ship shudders. The monitor flares up white and then fades to gray. It's an image from outside. He's started the engines. He's churning up the lake bed.

_Easy_, he thinks.

((I'm on my way,)) he comms.

* * *

><p>The sun has come up. Sideswipe lies on a trailer and watches the lake. Simmons has climbed out of his vehicle and stands next to it. He watches the water. All of the humans do.<p>

The surface hisses and bubbles. The waves climb higher onto the shore.

_Come on_, he thinks. _You can do this._

Something vast moves just beneath the surface. It bulges and the top of the ship breaks through. Water streams along the sides as it rises, engines roaring. The air shakes. Sideswipe can feel the rattling in his spark. Simmons's mouth hangs open.

"Holy shit!" one of the humans says.

The ship hovers for a moment, water cascading off, the engines frothing the lake below. It wobbles, rights itself and begins to creep toward shore.

_Come on, Hunter_.

The noise is terrific. He cuts power to his audios but he can see the sand shifting, feel the metal beneath him vibrating. He looks over to the humans and their vehicles and finds most of them have their hands over their ears.

Simmons's mouth moves. He points at the lake. The ship is coming in low and fast, way faster than it should be.

((Hunter, slow down,)) he says.

No response.

((Hunter? Hunter, you've got to slow down. You're going to hit us.))

Hunter makes some inarticulate noise. The nose of the ship jerks up. It tilts to the left.

((Whoa!) Sideswipe says. ((No, not so fast! You gotta—))

Too late. The aft of the ship plows into the water. The whole thing jerks. The engines change pitch and the nose drops. The ship slams into the shoreline hard enough to jolt Sideswipe into the air. Four humans fall. Simmons manages to catch himself on the hood of his car. Sideswipe's audios come back on to the whine of dying engines.

((Uh,)) Hunter says. ((Is everyone alright?))

Humans pick themselves back up. Simmons's cheeks puff out as he looks around. Sideswipe tries to sit up to see the damage but a nasty shock of pain forces him back down.

((I think so,)) he says. ((What happened?))

((I… I'm not sure,)) Hunter says. ((You started shouting at me.))

Simmons appears at the edge of the trailer. He drapes his arms over the side.

"So," he says. "You let a teenager drive your spaceship, huh?"

The nose is buried in the sand. The aft drags in the water. The whole thing lists slightly to the right and the cargo bay ramp opens up into the lake.

"Shut up, Simmons," he says.

* * *

><p>"This is bullshit!" Simmons says.<p>

Hunter sighs and rubs his face. Simmons's agents mill around. Several of them look at him in a way he doesn't like, their fingers a little too close to the triggers of their guns.

"I can get Sideswipe in by myself," Hunter says. "The ship isn't exactly built for humans. There're a lot of dangerous areas and I'm not going to be able to monitor everyone while I'm in the lab."

"That's horseshit, kid. You and I both know why you don't want me in there and it has nothing to do with personal safety."

_Goddamn, sometimes I hate this guy_, Hunter thinks.

"Look," he says. "I don't have time to stand around here and argue with you. Sideswipe's bleeding out. So can you please, please for once in your life, not argue with me and just… let me do what I need to?"

Simmons eyes narrow. He stares at Hunter for a full minute. He doesn't even look toward Sideswipe on the trailer some fifty feet to his left.

"Please," Hunter says. "Sideswipe isn't the only one who needs to be patched up."

Because even as he stands there and tries to glare down a fifteen foot robot-boy, Simmons refuses to put his weight on his right leg. His face is a puffy mass of bruises and every time he breathes in, Hunter can hear a high-pitched wheeze.

"Fine," Simmons says. "You win. We won't go in there. But I'm setting up a perimeter around this ship and if you try to bail out on me kid, I will shoot you down. Are we clear?"

"Crystal," Hunter says.

Simmons nods. He turns away and heads back to his convoy, leaving Hunter and Sideswipe and the semi truck.

((Obnoxious little fragger, isn't he?)) Sideswipe says.

Hunter snorts.

It takes him a minute to unhook Sideswipe's trailer from the truck. None of the agents offer to help. None of them speak to him. They just stay out of his way, careful not to make direct eye contact.

((Why are you so anxious to get away from them?)) Sideswipe says.

((What do you mean?))

((You're human. I thought you'd want to be around other humans.))

Hunter doesn't answer right away. He drags the trailer across the shore, the sand squeaking underfoot.

((It's not that,)) he says. ((Simmons is okay, I guess. Sometimes. But the other agents?))

((You don't trust them.))

((No.))

Hunter glances to Sunstreaker's spark container.

((It's just… back in Detroit, Simmons and I found this stash of Headmaster bodies—that's where I got this one. And Simmons wanted to take them, use them to fight the Decepticons. He actually pulled a gun on me. I convinced him to blow them up, instead, but what about the people he works for? What's to stop them from jumping to the same conclusion? What stops them from making their own Headmaster army?))

Because now they know where Hunter and Sideswipe are. They know where the ship is and they know Sideswipe is hurt.

((That won't happen,)) Sideswipe says.

((I don't know. This could get bad real quick. All it takes is one asshole with the right connections to send in the Air Force—))

((Once that hull is sealed, nothing short of a nuclear warhead will get through. If we see one coming, we can just park the ship into high orbit and wait.))

Hunter sighs again. ((If you say so.))

((It'll be fine,)) Sideswipe says. ((Whatever happens, we'll deal with it.))

((You're a lot peppier than usual,)) Hunter says.

Sideswipe looks at the pieces of Sunstreaker clutched to his chest.

((Yeah,)) he says. ((I am.))

* * *

><p>Hunter pauses outside the lab. The lights inside are on. He can see the berth across the room, the one he'd woken up on to find Sideswipe looming over him. It smells the same inside, an odd, electric tint to the air. He pulls the trailer in after him.<p>

Sideswipe is dead weight; Hunter has to haul him up. The 'bot winces a few times but doesn't say anything.

"You alright?" Hunter says.

"Yeah," Sideswipe says. He doesn't sound alright. "See that paneling over there?"

His eye flicks up toward the corner of the room. The wall is different, the metal sectioned off.

"There's a handle. Pull it to the side and you'll find a regen-tank. You're going to have to pull that out but it's set up to be mobile. It should move easy."

"Right," Hunter says.

The paneling slides away like a closet door. Lights inside wink on and Hunter finds himself staring at said "regen-tank." It's a metal cylinder taller than he is and almost twice his width. It's got a sheet of whatever Transformers use for plexi-glass on the front. The inside is empty and dark. A series of pipes and tubes attach at the top and the base and they unfold as Hunter slides it out.

"It's a bacta tank," he says.

"A what?" Sideswipe says.

Hunter shakes his head. "Never mind."

He drags it forward another few feet until something inside clicks. The floor hums, he hears a rapid-fire set of whirs and then the thing hisses.

"Good," Sideswipe says. "Put Sunny in there."

He doesn't say "head." He never refers to the different pieces of Sunstreaker as pieces, just "Sunny."

Hunter has spent the whole trip trying not to look at the head. It's worse up close. He can smell it up close, the stale stink of cold, burnt metal. The melted sections are smooth. Hunter reaches for it and pauses. Sideswipe still has it in a death grip.

The 'bot seems to realize what he's thinking, because a moment later he says, "Oh."

His arm twitches. Something up near his shoulder squeals and sparks and the whole thing falls limp. Sideswipe lets out a bark of pain. His voice statics out. Hunter can smell burning wire.

"Are you…" he says.

"Focus on Sunny," Sideswipe says.

Hunter slides Sideswipe's arm away. It's hard. The limb is stiff and it groans as he bends it. Hunter tries not to focus on the way Sideswipe tries not to writhe.

"Sorry," he says.

Sideswipe makes an inarticulate noise.

Then it's off and Hunter slides Sunstreaker's head free. He's careful not to look down at it as he turns back toward the tank.

"Just, just close the door," Sideswipe says, voice fizzing out. "Put him in an' close it. 'S automatic."

The inside of the regen tank smells funny, an old, moist, anti-septic scent with a strange, copper-tasting tinge to it. The walls are bare. There's nothing, no pedestal or anything to set Sunstreaker's head onto. Hunter settles for placing it on the floor of the tank and closing the door. The plexi-glass lights up with a jumble of symbols Hunter doesn't recognize. They flash at him for a moment and then twist around and change too fast for him to keep up with.

The tank makes a low, grinding sound. Another hiss. A glowing, magenta goo seeps in around the bottom. Hunter watches it long enough to realize that's probably what it's supposed to do and turns away.

"What now?" he says.

Sideswipe's remaining eye fixes on him.

"Now," he says with something Hunter is sorely tempted to call a wheeze, "the hard part."

Sunstreaker's spark container. He hasn't said a word about it. Looking at the expression on Sideswipe's face, Hunter _knows_ he's not going to like what's coming.

"Those data files I gave you?" Sideswipe says. "They're not just for piloting. There's another one."

It takes a moment for Hunter to rummage around in his own head to find it. Sideswipe gives what he thinks is supposed to be a bright smile. It comes out more of a horrible grimace.

"Open it," he says.

_I really hope this doesn't suck_, Hunter thinks.

This isn't a memory. He's not watching a movie in his head. This is more like a collage done in half-formed pictures. It's an idea.

It sucks.

"No," Hunter says.

"Just listen—"

"No way. You can't… I can't… I don't even know where, _how_—"

"I'll walk you through it," Sideswipe says.

"You're not a medic! You told me that yourself!"

"Just calm down—"

"You want me to cut you open! This… you're asking me to do open heart surgery!"

"Hunter, we need to stabilize Sunny's spark. Normally, with any other 'bot we'd be fragged. It'd take a medic—"

"Which I'm not and neither are you."

"You've done a really good job so far. Except for the part where you crashed the ship. Aside from that, you've done great," Sideswipe says.

Hunter stares.

"I'm his twin," Sideswipe says. "Our signals are the same. You can patch him into my systems. They won't reject him. You can hook his spark case up to mine—"

"This is so not a good idea."

"—and the proximity alone will help. Our sparks don't repel each other. Contact between them won't blow us up."

"_Blow up_?"

"It's nothing to worry about. It won't happen. Hunter, please. Even if we left right now, by the time we got to a medic, Sunny…"

_Won't make it_, Hunter finishes. The dead patches on the casing have spread. Sideswipe looks at him with such desperation.

"Son of a _bitch_," he says. "Fine. But you're telling me how to numb you first because I am _not_ digging around until you can't feel it."

"Deal," Sideswipe says.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe isn't sure how long it takes the human to finish what Machination started. As soon as Hunter turns off his pain receptors, it becomes hard to focus. He's tired. Only the faint pulse of Sunny keeps him online.<p>

"Okay," Hunter says. "I'm through,"

He can hear the exhaustion in his voice. Sideswipe's not the only one about to drop.

It's the moment of truth. Sideswipe has never heard of this being done before. Ever. Sunny and his internal systems are similar. Their sparks resonate at the same frequency. If he stands next to his brother, other 'bots can't tell them apart by scanner.

_It'll work_, he thinks.

It has to.

Hunter stands over him, his hands and arms smeared with energon. His fingers no longer tremble but that might just be because he no longer has the energy. Sunny's spark container still sits nestled in the crook of Sideswipe's right elbow.

"You're going to have to take him out of this thing," he says.

Hunter nods.

"You only need to attach him to a few of the lines," Sideswipe says.

"The silver wires?"

"That's them."

"Which ones?"

"Doesn't matter. Just make sure that when you patch Sunny in you follow the same line and connect the other end in, too. Don't want to have an in-flow on an open-ended line."

"Yeah," Hunter says. He shakes his hands a few times and mutters something about a "brain surgery."

He reaches for Sunny. Sideswipe lifts the container and looks away. He can still see the human moving out of the corner of his vision. He can hear him unscrewing the cap, see the movement as he tilts it up and reaches in and grabs Sunstreaker's spark.

Sideswipe grimaces.

It's wrong on so many levels. The spark is the 'bot. To have someone standing there, holding it cupped in the palm of their hands… and Hunter isn't even Cybertronian. He's an organic alien walking around in the copied body of one.

Hunter leans over him.

"Ready?" he says.

_No._

"Do it," Sideswipe says.

He brings his hands up, lowers them into Sideswipe's chest.

Nothing prepares him for it. Sparks don't interact like that. They aren't supposed to be that near to one another. In any other Cybertronian, Autobot or Decepticon, the energy fields would repel each other. Worst case scenario, combining two high-energy sources like that, they go small-scale nuclear.

Sideswipe is not "any" Cybertronian. Neither is Sunstreaker.

Hunter touches Sunny's spark case to Sideswipe's. A jolt of energy races through him. It's almost painful. Sideswipe hears himself yelp. He jerks off the table. Hunter jumps back.

"What the hell was _that_?" Hunter says.

Sideswipe can't answer. The bond, that small thread which ties the two of them together; it's been quiet for so long he's forgotten what it's like to have a real one and not just a phantom one. After so long, it wakes up. Not fully. Sunny is too weak for that. But there it is, a sliver of Sunstreaker stirs in his mind and Sideswipe isn't sure whether to laugh or scream.

"Sideswipe?"

He's tired. He's tired and weakened and there's a big, ugly wound in his mind and he doesn't know whether it's his twin's or his own and it might just belong to both of them.

"Sideswipe?"

Just a trickle. Just a hint of Sunstreaker. And he's not aware, he's not awake, but he's there. He's _there_.

"Thank you," Sideswipe says.

"Uh, yeah," Hunter says. "Do I even want to know?"

He doesn't answer. There are no words for it. He lets out a giggle that sounds suspiciously like a sob. This time, Hunter doesn't ask. He just gets back to work hooking Sunny up.

Sideswipe doesn't know how long it is after that that he finally offlines.

* * *

><p>On Sunday morning, three and a half days after getting kicked into a wall by a giant, alien robot, Jerri Stephens wakes up in a hospital bed to find someone standing in the doorway of her room. It's a woman. Her hand is raised, ready to knock. When she sees Jerri watching her, her hand drops back to her side.<p>

"Ms. Stephens?" she says.

The woman waits. When Jerri doesn't answer, she straightens up and comes into the room anyway.

"I'm Agent Liz Cantrell," she says, flashing a badge. "I'm with the FBI."

Jerri's eyebrows lift. Cantrell looks the part: black suit, her hair short and well-groomed. But Jerri has a knack for faces. She's seen this one before, underneath a helmet. She'd been at the rest stop three days ago. She's not FBI any more than Jerri is.

"Uh huh," Jerri rasps. Her throat catches. She coughs a few times, tries to clear some of the grittiness. She notices a tray next to her bed and reaches for the paper cup of water sitting on it. It's luke-warm, but she doesn't mind.

Cantrell's lips thin.

"Ms. Stephens, I need go over a few things with you," she says.

"Like what?" Jerri says. She sets down the cup and wipes her mouth, careful not to dislodge the oxygen tube hooked into her nose.

"Your previous employer," Cantrell says.

Movement in the doorway. Jerri looks over. Someone else saunters into her room. The bruises under his eyes have faded to a sick yellow. He's exchanged his tattered, dusty clothes for a sharp, clean suit. He's not wheezing anymore.

"Hey," Agent Simmons says. "How you doing?"

"Oh god," Jerri says.

He flashes a manic grin at her and rubs his hands together.

"I've spoken to my superiors," he says. "And we're ready to work out a deal with you."

"Uh huh."

"You don't serve any time in exchange for information. Provided you have information. If it turns up anything, we let the past be the past and move on with our lives."

"I have three broken ribs and a punctured lung," Jerri says. "What exactly do you want from me?"

Simmons leans down and places both hands on the foot of her bed.

"Machination," he says.

* * *

><p>Thanks so much to my reviewers, old and new. Nothing quite beats the nervous excitement of opening my email to see that little "review" tag. Thank you KayDeeBlu for finding most of my typos and stupid mistakes and not letting me discourage myself.<p>

Next chapter: We've Got a Problem


	20. We've Got a Problem

**Chapter Twenty: We've Got a Problem**

Sideswipe comes online as the last of the regen fluid slurps down the drain. The door has lifted. He finds himself staring out into the darkened lab and he has no idea how he got there.

He lifts his right hand and touches the front of his chest. Or the thick, ugly weld-line running down the center of it, anyway.

_Sunny._

He's in there, spark container nestled up against Sideswipe's. It feels weird and tingly.

"Oh," he says and holds his hand up. His fingertips have come back. "Awesome."

He's not getting any depth perception, though. His left eye is still a slagged mess.

"How long was I in here?" he says.

A little over a mega-cycle. Four planetary rotations. A quick glance down shows that he's nowhere near healed enough for the regen tank to be kicking him out. His left arm is scrapped. The open wounds aren't leaking, but the limb ends in tatters above his wrist. He tries to lift it but pain shoots up his shoulder.

"Nope," he says. "Not even close."

Hunter must have put him in there after welding him shut. The human had had the sense to haul his off-lined aft over and dump him in.

_Where is he, anyway?_

He shouldn't be up and about. The tank should have kept him under until it was done. Something has overridden that.

((Hunter?)) he comms.

((Sideswipe?)) Hunter says. ((Good. You'd better get up here.))

* * *

><p>Sideswipe stops just long enough to hose himself off. A few kliks later he strolls into the command deck. Hunter is plugged into one of the consoles. He looks up as Sideswipe enters.<p>

"Whoa," he says. "That tank thing really works."

"Medical nano-bots," Sideswipe says. "And a lot of energon. What's up?"

Hunter nods to the console screen. A blue light pulses near the top, left corner.

"It's been doing that for the last hour," Hunter says. "I don't know what it is and I didn't want to screw anything up poking around with it."

Sideswipe leans past him and taps the screen. Data scrolls across it.

"Huh," he says.

"'Huh' what?" Hunter says.

"It's an incoming transmission. Someone's calling the ship."

"Is that good or bad?"

"Depends," Sideswipe says. He formats his hand and plugs into the console. A moment later, ID codes flash up.

"It's Autobot," Sideswipe says. "It's coming from Ark-27. That's _Prime's_ ship."

He turns to find Hunter staring.

"You don't remember, do you?" the human says.

"Remember what?"

The plating of the face doesn't move, but Hunter tilts his head to the side and Sideswipe gets the distinct impression that he's smiling inside.

"The lab?" Hunter says. "When I was closing you up, you had me link into the communication lines."

It's Sideswipe's turn to stare.

"You really don't remember," Hunter says.

"I'm guessing you sent a transmission?"

"Sort of."

Sideswipe frowns. He racks his memories, trying to find something, anything to explain what's going on.

"Okay," Sideswipe says. "I give. What did you send?"

Hunter looks at him, looks back to the screen, and then pulls his hand free.

"You know," he says, taking a step back, "I think this body's getting low on energon. I'm gonna head back and see if I can't find some."

Sideswipe snags his arm as he tries to slip past.

"Hey, wait. What did you send?" he says.

The human shakes his head. He pulls free and ducks around Sideswipe.

"Hunter!"

And then he's through the doors. They hiss shut behind him.

_Glitchy human_, he thinks. He looks to the display.

The first thing he sees when he activates the channel is a mini-bot. It's yellow, with a pair of knobby antennae on the sides of its head. When the channel activates, it sort of straightens in surprise.

"Oh! Hey!" it says. It turns and shouts, "Hey! The line's open! It's _Sideswipe_."

"Oh Primus," someone says.

Footsteps approach. The mini-bot turns back just long enough to flash a "you're fragged now, pal" grin and then disappears from view. A mech takes its place, a taller mech with a white and black color scheme. A mech with a very familiar scowl on his face.

"Ah, slag," Sideswipe says.

"Sideswipe," Prowl says. "I see you've answered your comms in your usual timely fashion."

"Yes, sir," Sideswipe says. "Sorry, sir. I was in the lab."

Prowl gives him a once over. "Do I even want to know?"

Sideswipe tries not to fidget. He can see other faces behind the commander, other 'bots hedging in to watch the show.

"To what do I owe the pleasure of this communication?" Sideswipe says.

"'To whom it may concern,'" Prowl says, his optics never leaving Sideswipe's. He knows, without asking, that Prowl is reading the communication he had Hunter send. "'Best party ever. You totally missed out. LOL. P.S. You suck.'"

Dead. Silence. Sideswipe is pretty sure that's the sound of his future taking a nosedive and plowing into the ground.

((Hunter,)) he says.

((Yeah?))

((I'm going to kill you.))

((Hey, _you_ told me to send it.))

((You should have said no!))

((I dunno, Sideswipe. You were pretty adamant.))

To Prowl, he says, "I can explain that."

Prowl stops short of rolling his optics.

"I wasn't, ah, in my right frame of mind when I wrote that," Sideswipe says.

"Clearly," Prowl says.

"I was half-slagged and a bit delirious, so it's really not my fault."

"You were half-slagged and a bit delirious on a stolen ship, sending gibberish written in a _human_ language, a deca-cycle after assaulting an officer to steal aforementioned ship and deserting your post. Did I miss anything?"

Correction: _that_ was the sound of his future taking a nosedive.

"No, sir," Sideswipe says.

((Hey, Sideswipe?)) Hunter says.

((Busy.))

"What are your coordinates?" Prowl says.

For a moment, Sideswipe gives very serious thought into blasting into orbit and fleeing into deep space. But the gentle tingle of Sunny's spark against his own kills the idea before it gets off the ground. He sends his position. Prowl's optics narrow.

((Sideswipe.))

((Not now.))

"These are correct?" Prowl says.

"Yes, sir."

The sharpness in his gaze takes on a new level as it moves over Sideswipe's injuries. He's thinking. Sideswipe can actually _see_ him putting it all together.

"You stole a ship and went to Earth where you managed to sustain that level of damage?" Prowl says.

The doors hiss open. Sideswipe turns to shoo Hunter out only the human isn't alone.

"I'm sorry," Hunter says. "But he said it was an emergency and I don't think he's lying."

Agent Simmons has managed to fix himself up. His garments are clean and in one piece. The damage on his face seems to be mending. He trots in with no sign of a limp.

"Hey there, Red," he says. He glances to the screen. "Oh. More NBE's."

He lifts a hand and waves. Two or three of the 'bots wave back.

"What is _that_?" Prowl says. He's staring at Hunter, his expression hard, the door wings behind him rigid. Hunter freezes.

"Him?" Sideswipe says. "That's Hunter. You remember Hunter, don't you? He was on your ship for a while? He was with Sunny when they got taken and you left him behind. Don't worry, though. I found him for you."

"I'm not interrupting anything, am I?" Simmons says.

"Nah," Sideswipe says.

"Good. Because we've got a problem."

"What is going on in there?" Prowl says. "Why is there a human on board? And _what—_"

"What problem?" Sideswipe says to Simmons.

"I got a team went missing," Simmons says. "Well, probably missing. We lost contact about forty minutes ago and can't raise anyone."

"Went missing where?"

Simmons grimaces. "Now, before you go and bite my head off—yes, I'm talking to _you_, kid—I want you to know that this is not what it looks like, okay?"

"_Sideswipe_," Prowl says.

"Where?" Sideswipe says.

"It's a Machination facility," Simmons says. "Over in Pennsylvania. We went in to secure it—don't you roll your eyes at me, young man. We're trying to freeze them in their tracks and shut them down."

"Sideswipe, answer me," Prowl says. "Who is that human? Why are you in contact with it? What's happened?"

"Hey Prowl?" Sideswipe says. "I'm going to have to get back to you."

"Don't you _dare_ discon—"

Sideswipe cuts the transmission. Simmons stops talking and stands there with his eyebrows raised. Hunter' folds his arms over his chest. He hunkers down, pressed against the wall.

((Thank you,)) he says.

((No problem,)) Sideswipe says. Out loud, "Okay, Simmons. What's going on?"

* * *

><p>"What" is that. Not "who." <em>What<em>. That's what Prowl had asked. He might be an alien, he might be a robot, but Hunter has spent time around them and he knows disgust when he sees it. And he hadn't been alone. Half of the 'bots on the screen had been staring at him the same way.

"Yesterday morning we got intel on Machination warehouses and manufacturing sites," Simmons says. "We started mobilizing teams to go in and secure them, stop production, seize their assets. Most of them have gone off with minimal resistance. Seems when we took down that place in Detroit, we cut off leadership. These guys are in disarray right now. My superiors deemed it prudent to move in fast, take them down before they can pull themselves back together."

"Okay," Sideswipe says. He's focused on Simmons. He seems to do that, be able to hone in on something with absolute concentration. When he wants to, anyway. Hunter wonders where that attention is going to settle now that he's got Sunstreaker back.

"This team, it's headed by an Agent named Vikus. They arrived on-site at 9:13," Simmons says. He checks his watch. "That was forty-eight minutes ago. They kept radios open. Last we heard from them they were entering the building. That was at 9:18. We haven't been able to establish contact since."

Forty-three minutes. Hunter forces himself to focus on that. Focus on what's going on right now and not the looks on the Autobot's faces, 'bots he'd met. Forty-three minutes and not the suspicion, the horror, Bumblebee's eyes all wide.

"Why'd you wait so long?" Hunter says.

"There are procedures for this kind of thing," Simmons says. "I had to fight like hell for my agency to agree to bring you two in."

"Bring us in?"

Sideswipe's hand drifts up to his chest.

"Look, I know it might be asking a lot right now," Simmons says. He glances at Sideswipe. "I need you guys. You two know more about these people than anyone else I've got in the field right now. And contrary to what some may think, I do know when I'm out-classed."

Sideswipe is in no state for this. Sure, he looks a lot better, he's got fingers again and the dark patches on his armor have shrunk, but his left hand is still gone. Hunter can see stiffness when he moves. The inner shell around his spark case isn't welded shut because with Sunstreaker in there, there wasn't enough room to close it. Hunter is not a medic. He's not even a mechanic. But even he knows that right now, Sideswipe is held together with nothing more than band-aids and happy thoughts.

"You want us to go in," Sideswipe says.

"Yes," Simmons says. "This is not official. This is just my own, personal request. I'm not asking you to engage. This is reconnaissance only. Just pop in, see what's going on, and pop back here."

((Is this a good idea?)) Hunter comms. ((We'd have to do that jump thing and you said earlier that you didn't want to risk it.))

((I was leaking all over the place earlier,)) Sideswipe says. ((Sunny's spark is shielded now.))

Simmons snaps his fingers. "Hey. Down here, please."

"Why should we help you?" Hunter says.

"Seriously?" Simmons says. "Oh, don't tell me you're getting cynical on me now. That's my job."

"That's not what I—"

"This stops Machination. We are ending them. You want to make them pay for what they did? Don't argue with me, I can see it written all over you. You've been itching to tear them down the whole time I've known you. This is your chance, kid."

Hunter has no answer for that.

"Reconnaissance only," Sideswipe says.

"That's right."

Sideswipe rumbles something in Cybertronian. He looks at Hunter.

* * *

><p>((What if this is a trap?)) Hunter says. ((You said they couldn't get us in here. Well, now we're coming out. I don't like it. It's too convenient.))<p>

((If it's a trap, it's a really bad one,)) Sideswipe says. The orbital jump drive is powering up. The ship's processor is locking onto the target coordinates, projecting a path for them. He can watch all of this going on in the back of his mind.

((I still don't like it.))

((Neither do I.))

((Then why are we going? You've got no reason to go,)) Hunter says. He makes a gesture to the weld line. Sideswipe places his hand over it. He can feel the hum of Sunny's spark through his own armor.

((It's a quick jump,)) he says. ((In and out.))

((So I can go by myself,)) Hunter says. ((You don't need to risk him.))

((Sunny's in the safest place he can be right now. I'm not letting you go alone. You have no idea what you're getting into and you have no combat experience.))

((I got you out of Detroit, didn't I?))

((By blowing up a store of energon.))

((I _didn't know_, okay? Would you drop that, already?))

Sideswipe lifts his head long enough to grin at the human. ((Even a 'con would know better. I let you go by yourself and you'll get yourself slagged.))

Hunter looks away. Sideswipe _chuffs_ and returns his focus back to the display. Simmons had been kind enough to provide satellite images of the area. It's another large warehouse nestled in the middle of a valley, surrounded on all sides by trees. It's the perfect spot for an ambush.

((I'm not going just to cover your aft,)) he says. ((I owe Simmons, too.))

Simmons, who is sitting on the console behind Sideswipe, watching the screen a little too intently.

Hunter grumbles something that Sideswipe doesn't catch.

There. Their trajectory locks on.

"We're good," he says. Simmons sits up straighter. "I've set it to remote access so Simmons, you won't have to do a thing."

((You mean, in case it's a trap we can get ourselves back,)) Hunter says.

((Bingo.))

"What, you don't trust me?" Simmons says.

"I don't trust your tiny processor," Sideswipe says. "If you screwed up even a little, our atoms'd be scattered across this solar system. This way, I take care of it. Hunter, you ready?"

The human's entire frame is tensed. He nods.

"Simmons?" Sideswipe says. "Not that you can do much, but don't touch anything while we're gone, alright?"

"Scouts honor."

Hunter snorts.

"I've sealed off the lab and the engine room," Sideswipe says. "There's nowhere else for you to go. Best just to stay put. We'll be right back."

Simmons makes a "meh" sound and waves a hand at them.

((Initializing,)) Sideswipe says. The ship locks onto them. He can feel it buzzing in his mind.

"Oh, whoa," Hunter says. "That… that's really weird."

"It gets better," Sideswipe says.

The air around them shimmers. Green flashes streak up. The buzzing extends down, into his frame. Everything is rattling, every atom of his being vibrating.

"I don't think I like this," Hunter says.

Sideswipe grins.

The world dissolves. There is nothing. Absolute nothing.

Reality hits and Sideswipe finds himself crouching in a clump of trees outside the warehouse. The temperature is cool. Moisture clings to vegetation. Organics chirp and chitter in the forest around him.

A lurching sound. He turns and spots Hunter kneeling in the bushes, head down.

((You okay?)) Sideswipe says.

Hunter replies with a garbled whine.

((The first couple dozen jumps are like that,)) Sideswipe says. ((After a while, you get used to it.))

((That… that was the most _awful_ thing I've ever done,)) Hunter says. ((_Ever_. Holy shit, I think I died.))

((Your molecules were shot through time and space. For a nano-klik, yeah, you were basically dead.))

((Oh god. Do we have to do that again?))

((Unless you'd rather drive back to the ship.))

Hunter groans.

The warehouse is about a hundred metras away. It's a low building; Sideswipe could just manage to walk around inside without having to crouch. That doesn't mean much; Machination seems to have a penchant for building underground.

There are a few cars in the parking lot, all empty. On the other side of the lot are the black SUV's Simmons's people favor so much. What Sideswipe doesn't see, anywhere, on any kind of sensor, is movement.

((Hunter,)) he says, ((you picking up anything?))

((No,)) he says. ((According to the, what do you call them? Scanners? There's nothing there.))

((They're using dampeners,)) Sideswipe says. ((They're a low-grade EMP. They scramble energy waves, confuse sensors. It's Cybertronian tech.))

((Great.))

Sideswipe moves forward, Hunter trailing behind him as they step out of the bushes.

((Is this really the best approach?)) Hunter says. ((Just walking up?))

((See those cameras? Whoever's in there saw us arrive. There's no reason to try to sneak in now. Just be ready to start shooting.))

A slight whir as Hunter reformats his arm into a pulse rifle.

It's obvious where Simmons's team went in: one of the bigger, rolling doors is open. The cement below is charred where they must have set explosives. He can smell traces of something in the air, some kind of harsh, chemical reek.

((Is that tear gas?)) Hunter says.

The hangar inside is empty, bare floor, bare walls. There's another large door in the back, also open, the corridor beyond dark and empty.

((Heads up,)) Sideswipe says.

The warehouse is quiet. Not just "background noise kept at a dull murmur," but _silent_. The only thing he hears is the wind outside and his own hydraulics as he eases deeper into the room.

((Where is everyone?)) Hunter says.

Sideswipe pauses at the door. He motions Hunter over next to him.

((You're going to have to go in first,)) he says.

((But—))

((I've got no weapons. I'll be right behind you. If I say "shoot" you start shooting and you don't stop.))

((_Shit_.))

Hunter slides past him, back against the wall, weapon up.

((Hey,)) Sideswipe says. When Hunter turns to look, he says, ((Don't stay so close to the wall. Sometimes rounds follow them. You'll get your head blown off.))

Hunter edges away.

The left hallway leads deeper into the building. That's where they go. They have to turn on headlights to see anything. The hallway is wide, the ceiling low. And still, no sign of humans. The soft _hiss-thump_ of their footsteps echo in the dark. It gets warmer the deeper they go.

Sideswipe catches himself rubbing the weld-line again.

They've gone maybe fifty metras when Hunter stops.

((What?)) Sideswipe says.

Hunter's looking down. Small, golden tubes shine in the glow of their lights. They're lying all over the floor. He kneels down and reaches past Hunter's legs to pick one up.

((Bullet cartridges,)) Hunter says. ((Big ones. Those aren't from hand guns.))

_Slag_.

((Do we keep going?)) Hunter says.

Sideswipe thinks he can see the edges of a doorway up ahead. There are no bodies, human or otherwise. No cries of the wounded. Just silence.

((The hallway opens up ahead,)) Sideswipe says. ((We get there, and if we don't find anything, we call it a bust and leave.))

It takes forever to cover that last stretch of ground. Hunter stares straight ahead, frame wound so tight Sideswipe thinks he hears it creak a few times. Not that he's much better. He keeps checking behind them, audios straining for the slightest noise.

More casings on the cement as they continue. They lie in clusters. The agents had been chasing someone, pausing as a group to open fire. But there's no blood, no energon. Whatever they were shooting at, they weren't hitting anything.

Ten metras from the end of the hall, Sideswipe smells it.

((Oh god,)) Hunter says.

A thick, heavy stench wafts out of the square of darkness up ahead. Sideswipe has never smelled anything like it before. He knows it's organic, and when Hunter stops again, he knows it's bad.

The hallway opens up into a vast room. The floor ramps down. It's so big their lights don't even reach the far wall. There's enough space in there for Sideswipe to park his ship.

They've found Simmons's men.

((Jesus Christ,)) Hunter says.

Sideswipe squats down to get a better view. He thinks he's looking at two individuals, but it's hard to be sure. There are no burn marks, no charring. Just twisted and torn organic material.

This is where the smell comes from. Hunter makes a heaving noise.

Sideswipe heads into the room. The floor is sticky. There's no sign of whoever, _what_ever did this, because Sideswipe has a pretty good idea of _what_ it might have been.

((Hunter,)) he says. ((I need you over here.))

((I can't,)) Hunter says. ((I can't do this.))

((You have to.))

((No way.))

((Hunter, whatever did this might still be here,)) Sideswipe say. ((If we split up, we die. So come on.))

((Why do we have to go in there? Why can't we just go back? We should leave. Now.))

((I have to check something.))

((Check _what_?))

_Why that thing came here. What was so important that of all the places on the planet, it came __**here**__?_

((This might not be all of them,)) Sideswipe says. ((You really want to go and leave behind someone wounded?))

Hunter looks at him for a long moment. The human is a smart organic—it's a terrible bluff and he knows it. Hunter wants to bolt and Sideswipe doesn't blame him. All of his own instincts scream that this is not a good place to be, to leave, now, get to the ship, lock the doors, and blast into orbit. But he can't. Not yet. There's something here. The humans died _here_ for a reason.

Hunter steps off the ramp. He doesn't look down, not once, not even as his feet squelch.

They move in, leaving the carnage behind. It's worse than the corridor. In the corridor, they had walls on two sides. There were only two directions to attack from. Here, they're out in the open, walking in a halo of their own light, a bright beacon to anything in that room.

Twenty nano-kliks in and Hunter says, ((Do you hear that?))

A low thrum in the floor. Three steps later and Sideswipe catches a whiff of burnt ozone.

Dread slithers through his frame and wraps tight in his chest.

((Oh no,)) he says.

He knows this smell. It floats in the woods outside. It curls in the air of the command deck in his ship.

Sideswipe starts to run.

Up ahead, appearing out of the gloom, is the circular edge of a console. It's half-buried in the floor, tubes leading down, connecting into whatever power source the freak must have scavenged.

It's an orbital jump-drive and someone has used it very recently. Only a few kliks ago.

When Sideswipe and Hunter showed up.

"Fraggit!" he says.

"What?" Hunter says. "What is that thing?"

Sideswipe reaches out to his ship's processor and kicks on his own jump-drive. His frame hums as the ship locks in.

"What the hell is going on?" Hunter says.

"It's a jump drive," Sideswipe says. "That freak was here. He lured us here."

"What freak? Who's here?"

"_Scorpinok_. The nano-klik we got here he must have traced us, back-tracked our coordinates."

"Wait, you're saying he knows where the ship is?"

Green streaks light up the air. Sideswipe's frame buzzes like it's trying to shake apart. When he speaks, the sound comes out distorted.

"He knows where it is and he's already there," he says.

Existence stops.

* * *

><p>Next chapter: Not Alone<p> 


	21. Not Alone

**Chapter Twenty-One: Not Alone**

Hunter stumbles forward and catches himself on a console. His hand flies up to his mouth. The ground sways beneath him. He has to squeeze his eyes shut as his throat clenches, hard.

He forces himself upright. His arms shake. Sideswipe is right next to him. They're on the command deck of their ship, standing in the exact place they jumped from.

_So where is Scorpinok?_

The room is only so big and there are no places to hide.

"Whoa, kid, what the hell happened?"

Simmons is there, on his feet, standing on the edge of a console.

"Hunter," Sideswipe says, his voice low and tense. "Get Simmons and get off."

"Where are you—" Hunter says.

"Right now."

"Someone going to tell me what the hell is going on?" Simmons says.

Sideswipe leans over and scoops the agent up with one arm, pinning him to his chest like a doll.

"Hey!" Simmons says. "Shit, watch the shoulder!"

Sideswipe shoves him at Hunter. Hunter fumbles, manages to catch the man in two hands.

"Jesus _Christ_," Simmons says. "What's the big idea here?"

"You _get him out_," Sideswipe says. He turns and trots over to the doors.

"Where are you going?" Hunter says.

"Lab."

"But—"

"I've gotta get Sunny. I'll meet you outside. Go. _Now_."

Sideswipe presses himself into the wall. He pauses for a moment. Hunter expects to see him take a deep breath or something, but he just reaches over and palms the door control and they slide open.

The hallway is empty.

Hunter almost sags in relief. No giant bug monster waiting on the other side. Except that it's a big ship and that thing could be anywhere.

Sideswipe doesn't say anything else. He slides into the hallway and then he's gone.

"Fuck," Hunter says.

Simmons shifts. Hunter realizes he's got the agent dangling from his arms.

"Oh," he says. He sets him down and looks back at the door.

"Kid," Simmons says.

Simmons. Simmons standing in the middle of the control room with him and there's a giant, metal psychopath slinking through the ship and the only way out is through those doors.

"Hunter," Simmons says. "Look at me. That's it. Now tell me, what's going on? What happened out there? You two are totally freaked out and it's making me nervous. A little information, please."

"Your team," Hunter says. "They're gone. It was Scorpinok. He traced us here."

"Who?" Simmons says.

"He… it's a Transformer. He's behind Machination."

They need to leave. They need to run.

Hunter transforms. It takes less than five seconds. Before he's even done, he lifts the passenger side door.

"Get in," he says.

Simmons doesn't argue. He slides in and grabs for the seatbelt.

"He traced us," Hunter says through his internal speakers. "And then he jumped. He's here, somewhere."

"Ah," Simmons says. He sounds calm, like his usual blasé self. But Hunter can literally feel his pulse double.

They've got to get off of the command deck. They've got to get out those doors. They've got to get off the ship.

_Move, Hunter_.

He can see the hallway. The doors are still open. At this angle, he can see a few hundred feet down the hall until it cuts a sharp corner. Sideswipe went out there. If he ran into Scorpinok, Hunter would have heard something. He doesn't. All he hears is the hum of the ship and the whirring of his own body and the rasp of Simmons breathing.

_**Move**__, damnit!_

Simmons's fingers dig into the door panel and the seat cushion.

Hunter rolls forward. The only sound is the soft noise of his tires on the metal deck. The hallway is empty, barren. No sign of Sideswipe. No sign of Scorpinok. No sign of anything at all.

Hunter's sensors go dark. It's not that there's nothing to register, it's that he registers nothing. He's being blocked. He's not alone on this ship.

_Oh god, oh god._

Inside the frame, he clenches his eyes shut.

_Focus_, he thinks. _You have to do this. You have to get Simmons off. You can't freak out, not right now. You've got to keep your shit together._

He's got weapons. Even in car form, he's got weapons. A thought becomes a command and the panels over his tail end shift apart. Missile launchers—_his_ missile launchers—lift up.

"Ookay," Simmons says. His weight shifts as he moves to face the front again. "Okay, kid. You and me, right?"

"Yeah," Hunter says.

Straight down the corridor. Take a right, then a left, and he's in the cargo bay. Easy. It's not far. He can do this. He _has_ to do this.

He drives.

The ship is silent. Nothing from Sideswipe. No shouting, no explosions, only the awful silence. The lines where the wall and the floor meet look sharper. He feels sick. His eyes sting. Simmons places a hand on his dashboard and only then does he realize that he's shaking, actually shaking, his armor rattling.

They're at the corner. Hunter slows to a crawl, inches forward. The missile launchers twist around as he looks to the right. He edges out.

Nothing.

Hunter wants to scream. He wants to hit something, shoot something, transform and claw at the walls, the floor, something, _anything_ to get him out of here. Instead, he drives, watching for the slightest movement, listening for the faintest sound. Past sealed doors, storage compartments, maintenance hatches, fifty feet, sixty feet. The left-hand turn comes up and no sign of anyone.

He hates the silence.

Left turn, empty hallway. The cargo bay is dead ahead. Sunlight streams through open doors. He can smell the breeze coming off the water. It's right there. He could floor it, be down the ramp and into the lake in seconds.

The doors are open.

Hunter didn't open them.

He can't stop the sound that bubbles out of him; a breathless groan, a low, animal sound. Simmons's fingernails dig into the upholstery.

He'd checked those doors. They were shut. They were _locked_. Someone else has opened them. Someone else has come through the cargo bay, into this hall.

_The lab_.

This corridor leads right to it. Leads right to Sideswipe.

"Oh god," he says.

"Kid?"

Sideswipe is alone. He's going in alone. Going toward that _thing_ and he has no back-up, no _weapons_.

The lake is right there. Hunter can make it. Put pedal to the metal and get the hell out of here. He can do it. He's a teenager, for Christ's sake. He's not even old enough to vote. He's just a kid. What the hell does he know about fighting? What the hell does he know about anything?

"Hunter?" Simmons says.

It's so close. The sun sparkles off the waves. He can run. He can get away from here, go anywhere. He's fucked up every single time he's tried to do the right thing. He'd tried to stop Machination but the only thing he's actually managed to do is to get people killed.

It would be so easy to run… he just has to let two more people die.

Hunter screeches forward. Simmons is thrown back, into the seat. His feet come off the floor. The hallway rushes past in a blur. The doors get bigger and bigger, the sunlight brighter. Hunter flies through. His tires leave the deck and for two seconds, he's airborne.

He slams back down, skids down the ramp, his back end sliding out. He squeals to a stop and throws his door open.

"Go," he says.

Simmons unlatches himself and staggers out. Hunter is already transforming, pushing up with changing arms onto legs that haven't formed feet yet.

"You're going back in?" Simmons says.

"Someone came through here," Hunter says. "If it was Scorpinok, he's headed for the lab and Sideswipe."

Simmons's lips thin.

"If… if we don't…" Hunter says. "I don't know what Scorpinok will do. He might just leave. But if he doesn't…"

"I'll have you know," Simmons says, straightening his suit jacket, "that we're not completely helpless. I meant that about shooting you down. I been dealing with NBE's a long time, kid. Longer than you've been alive. We've got some tricks up our sleeves."

Hunter nods.

"You sure you wanna do this?" Simmons says.

Hunter looks back, into the ship. The light reflected light dances along the interior.

"I have to," he says.

"Alright," Simmons says. "Good luck."

He starts down the ramp. Hunter watches him for a moment and then turns away.

"Hey kid," Simmons says. He's stopped just short of the lake. "Tear that bastard a new asshole for me, will you?"

Inside his shell, Hunter smiles. He opens his mouth to reply.

Deep within the ship, something roars.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe is too late. He knows this before the doors to the lab even come into view. The scent of burnt-ozone stirs the air. Hydraulics hiss. Air intakes sigh. Scorpinok is in the lab. That freak is in there with Sunny.<p>

Scorpinok is huge. In mech form, on two legs, he towers over Sideswipe, twice his height. The claw-like horns on the sides of his helm brush the ceiling. His legs are as thick as Sideswipe's torso. His bulk fills the lab, blocking Sideswipe from the regen-tank and his brother's head.

"Ah," Scorpinok says. "There you are."

It's the face, Sideswipe decides—or the lack of one, anyway—that is the defining characteristic of a Headmaster. Scorpinok is bigger than Hunter, bigger than the rip-off copies of Sunny. His head is too big to just be a folded up human. It's got more armor, more pieces. But it still has the tell-tale gaps, the cracks in the features where Sideswipe can see inside, see those pieces connecting.

"Is that why you take the bug form?" Sideswipe says, stepping through the doors. "So no one takes one look at your face and knows what you are?"

Scorpinok doesn't answer right away. He turns his head, optics narrowed behind the orange optical visor. He gives Sideswipe a once-over.

"We suppose this is the part where you ask us why we did it," Scorpinok finally says.

"Nah. This is the part where I tell you to get out of my way before I rip that head of yours off."

Sideswipe is sure that if he could, the freak would sneer. He looks back at the regen-tank.

He's standing between the wall and the medical berth. There's room for Sideswipe to slip past. The Headmaster is fast, though. Too fast. And Sideswipe's not healed. His outer armor is welded together but he can feel the shift in his chest when he moves. His spark casing is still open. One hit from those monstrous hands will bust him open.

"We'd heard of twins," Scorpinok says. "Very rare. You're the only pair we know of."

Sideswipe can see the tank. If he times it right…

"We should have known better," Scorpinok says. "So many to choose from. Perhaps we chose wrong."

Now. He's got to do it now. Get the tank open, grab Sunny. Get out now, while the Headmaster is busy monologuing.

But Scorpinok turns again. He gives Sideswipe an appraising stare.

"Ah," he says. "Very clever. We were wondering where you'd hidden him."

It takes every shred of willpower Sideswipe has not to cover the weld line.

"A solution only _you_," the freak spits the word out, "could possibly hope to pull off."

Sunny's spark flutters. Sideswipe clenches his fist.

"Such lesser creatures," Scorpinok says. "You have no idea what you've done."

"And I don't really care," Sideswipe says.

The bug's chin drops. He manages a sort of blank-faced scowl.

"We suppose you wouldn't," he says. "Too wrapped up in your own petty miseries to understand what we're trying to accomplish."

"Oh, I see what you've 'accomplished' all right. Putting an organic where your processor used to be? And here I thought you were supposed to be smart."

"Baiting us," Scorpinok says. He pauses. His head tilts to the side. "Very well. We will oblige you."

Scorpinok lunges. His bulk rushes forward. Sideswipe dives to the right. The bug's fist blurs past with a whoosh of air. He turns, bearing down.

Sideswipe scrambles, not to the side, but toward the 'con, landing with a painful screech between his legs. Scorpinok lifts his foot. He stomps down. Sideswipe is already rolling over the 'con's other foot, coming up behind the berth.

Something inside him screeches. Sunny's spark gives off a burst of energy. Sideswipe clutches at the weld line and stumbles. His knees hit the deck. He grabs the edge of the berth.

A blur of movement. He looks up. Scorpinok's fist flies straight at him. It's going to hit. Sideswipe isn't going to move in time—

A plasma bolt rips through the side of Scorpinok's face. The bug shrieks. He spins away, both hands coming up to clamp over the wound.

"Oh shit."

Hunter stands in the doorway. His hand is formatted into a pulse rifle. The tip of it glows.

"Hunter?" Sideswipe says.

Scorpinok growls. The sound reverberates through the air.

"Oh _shit_," Hunter says.

"_You_," Scorpinok says. The two ion-cannons mounted on his shoulders swivel to fix on the human.

"Sideswipe!" Hunter says. "The tank!"

Scorpinok fires. The human yelps and ducks out, into the hall. Sideswipe has a clear shot. He scrambles across the floor, over Scorpinok's foot. The 'con rears back. His optics lock onto Sideswipe.

Another shot hits him in the shoulder. Scorpinok stumbles. Sideswipe ducks as the other foot flies over him.

"We will _obliterate_ you!" Scorpinok says.

Hunter shouts something but it's lost in the sound of Scorpinok's ion cannons tearing through the wall. Sideswipe sees a flash of silver.

Sunny. He's got to get to Sunny.

Sideswipe crawls. Something inside him has loosened. Energon drips out as he drags himself on three limbs across the floor.

A crash behind him. Scorpinok is in the hallway. Hunter comes scrabbling between his legs only this time, the 'con is ready. He twists and drops. His hand catches Hunter as he starts to stumble to his feet. The human is knocked to the floor and pinned, face-down.

"Hunter!" Sideswipe says.

Hunter thrashes. Scorpinok leans back, lifting his other hand. He's going to hit him. He's going to smash his head in.

"No!"

But Hunter manages to wrench one arm free. It's his right one. He lifts his pulse rifle and starts shooting. Most shots miss. The last two hit Scorpinok in the chest and in the throat.

"Ragh!"

Scorpinok jerks away. Hunter wriggles, manages to turn around, push himself up on one arm.

And shoots Scorpinok in the face.

The Headmaster flails. He arches back, hits the wall. Sideswipe can smell burnt plating and the tang of energon.

"Sideswipe, move it!" Hunter says.

No time for the door. His right arm transforms. Plating jumbles down, forms a solid pile-driver. He swings it at the tank. The clear panel cracks. Regen fluid sprays out. A soft alarm chimes.

"Shit!" Hunter says. "He's getting up!"

He keeps shooting.

Sideswipe plunges his hand through the hole. Fingers grasp at Sunny's head. He fumbles; the fluid is slick, he can't get a hold. He brushes one of the ridiculous head fins and latches on. He drags Sunny's head up, through the viscous goo and through the hole. He almost drops it again before he can bring it up and cradle it to his chest.

Scorpinok fills the hall. Hunter is keeping a steady barrage of fire on him, but the 'con is large. His armor is thick. He's twisted away, hunched down, shielding his head. As Sideswipe sprints for the door, the bug lashes out with one foot. It catches Hunter in the side. He's flipped backward into the wall.

Scorpinok kicks again, this time at Sideswipe. Sideswipe jumps. The leg clips his foot. He lands in a stumble and keeps going.

"Up!" Sideswipe says. "We gotta bail!"

Hunter shakes his head. He pulls himself up and sort of falls against the wall again.

Behind them—Sideswipe doesn't look; _no time, gotta bail_—he can hear Scorpinok climbing to his own feet.

"Here," Sideswipe says, holding up Sunny's head.

"What?" Hunter says. The word is slurred. "But that's—"

"Take him. Hurry!"

The human takes Sunny's head in both hands. Sideswipe grabs one of his arms and pulls him away from the wall. He takes off running, the human staggering behind.

The cargo bay doors are just ahead. Sunlight streams in.

A tug on his arm. Hunter stumbles. His optics aren't focused.

"Move it," Sideswipe says.

Heat on the back of his helm. Sideswipe ducks. The shot streaks overhead. Sideswipe risks a glance over his shoulder. Scorpinok is doubled over, folding in on himself, transforming. His ion cannons, now near the base of his twisting tail, are aimed right at them.

The hallway is too open. There's no cover.

Sideswipe skids to a stop. He whips Hunter around and shoves him into a hallway to the left. Hunter almost falls but then Sideswipe sprints past him, grabbing his arm again and hauling him up.

"What—"

"This way!"

Rapid pounding on the deck. Scorpinok is coming after them.

Another turn. Another left. An ion blast shrieks past. The heat scorches the side of Sideswipe's faces as it misses him and chews into the wall instead. The bug's legs skitter. He can feel it through the floor.

"Run all you like," Scorpinok says. "We're going to catch you. We're going to _crush_ you."

Doors. Sideswipe shoves Hunter through. He cocks his fist and smashes the sensor and ducks through. He reformats his hand and plunges it into the controls on the inside. Scorpinok barrels right at him.

_Where, where? Where's the fraggin code—_

The doors hiss shut. The frame _thunks_ as it locks.

"Hunter," Sideswipe says, breaking away and scurrying over to the closest command console. "Plug in. Start the engines."

"But I'm not—"

"_Now._"

"Mother_fucker_."

Sideswipe is already into the ship's files. Command codes flash on the display.

_Bam!_

Scorpinok hits the door. A jolt races through the floor. Sideswipe staggers. Hunter starts to swear.

_Bam!_

A new tremor, this one a deep hum as the engine come online.

"Where am I going?" Hunter says.

"Up," Sideswipe says. "As far as you can, as fast as you can."

The engines take on a deeper sound. The ship rattles. Scorpinok pauses. Sideswipe can picture him tilting that ugly head of his.

"What are you doing in there, little Autobot?" he says.

_Something you're not gonna like,_ Sideswipe thinks.

The deck beneath him sways. He doesn't have to bring up visuals to know they've left the ground. He can feel the rocking motion as Hunter tries to keep the ship level.

The banging on the door starts up again, harder.

"What now?" Hunter says.

"I'm gonna 'jump us."

There! The code he's looking for. It's surrounded in security nets and warnings. Sideswipe brushes past them.

((Warning,)) the ship comms. ((Once activation—))

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Sideswipe says. He plows through the "cautions" and the "do you wish to proceeds" until he gets to the last bit.

The door shudders.

"What are you doing?" Hunter says. He's plugged into the system, too. Sideswipe can sense him on the fringes, watching. He can feel his growing concern.

"Doing?" Sideswipe says.

"What is that?"

"A surprise," he says. He sets it in. He lifts his head to flash a grin. Only Hunter is staring past him—

"Look out!"

A squeal. Scorpinok's tail punches through the door. He rips it out and lets loose with the ion cannons. Sideswipe ducks, starts to pull his hand free. A shot blasts past him and hits the console. He sees it, sees the flash. Has enough time to say, "Fr—"

"_Sideswipe!_"

Pain rips into him. His hand burns. His arm burns. His mind burns. His processor locks up, glitches out. His thoughts jumble and scramble.

He's lying on the floor. He's twitching. Pain in his right hand. Pain in his chest. Looking up at the ceiling. Movement. Noise. He forces his optics down, forces his mind to work, to sort out what he's seeing.

A tail stabbing through the door. Two, enormous pincers reaching in and tearing at a hole, shredding it. A larger form forcing its way through. Bug legs pushing it, wriggling, into the room. Plasma bolts burst around its frame. It lifts a pincer to shield its head.

Silver next to him. A hand grabs him, drags him away from a smoking control console, away from the door and the bulky thing slithering in toward him.

He can move.

Sideswipe jerks. Hunter drops him. But it's too late. They're too slow. And Scorpinok is fast, impossibly fast, Headmaster fast. Before Hunter can grab him again, the 'con is _there_.

Sideswipe pushes Hunter away.

A pincer slams into Sideswipe's left arm. Pain explodes. His vocalizer statics out as he screams. He's pinned, his arm crushed into the floor.

Scorpinok lifts his pincer, Sideswipe's arm held in its grasp. He's pulled up, off the floor. His shoulder makes a horrible _pop_ and sparks fly. He actually feels the strut disconnect.

The Headmaster lifts him up. His feet dangle in the air. He can barely think through the sheer agony that is his shoulder. He kicks, legs jerking.

Scorpinok chitters. The pincer moves; his shoulder pulls. The ship tilts and wiring tears and armor snaps. For one, brief nano-klik, his mind blanks.

Sideswipe hits the deck. Whatever has been holding him together inside ruptures. His chest caves in. He can't even scream.

"Sideswipe!"

Scorpinok looms over him. In this form he doesn't have a mouth. He doesn't need one. His laugh is more a snarl. His tail arches overhead.

Sideswipe doesn't see it move.

Something smacks into him. He feels the jolt, feels the impact. Then his optics focus and he's staring at the bladed tip of Scorpinok's tail. It's buried in his chest, right through the weld-line, right through his fragging spark. He's speared to the floor.

Liquid fire spreads though his chest. He makes a peculiar coughing sound.

Scorpinok _giggles_.

"Two 'bots with one blow," he says.

He can't… he can't… the fire moves down his limbs. He can't move. He hears a rushing, a white noise static. The fire reaches his neck, starts to claw up.

"Sun…" he says.

Scorpinok pulls his tail free. Sideswipe jerks up, off the floor. He sees a flash of brilliant blue and…

* * *

><p>Scorpinok wrenches his tail out of Sideswipe. The red Autobot falls to the ground, limp. Something flashes in the hole punched through his chest. Something explodes. Then Sideswipe goes dark.<p>

"No," Hunter says.

Scorpinok tilts his head to look at Hunter. He steps over Sideswipe.

"Come here," he says.

* * *

><p>Next chapter: Together<p> 


	22. Together

**Chapter Twenty-Two: Together**

Sideswipe and Sunstreaker sit in the brig. The lighting flickers. Outside their walls, an explosion rumbles through the base. They've been in there for ages, seated on the floor on opposite sides of the cell.

Sideswipe tilts his head back. His helm knocks against the wall.

"Sounds like it's getting bad," he says.

Sunstreaker says nothing.

"I wonder when they'll get off their afts and get down here and let us out."

The noise outside is terrific. It sounds like something is tearing through the walls above. Sideswipe stares at the ceiling for a while. He absently rubs at his chest.

"How long have we been down here?" he says. Because he really doesn't know. His chronometer isn't working. It seems like a long time, though. Like a lifetime.

Sunny still doesn't say anything. Sideswipe huffs and says, "Alright, what's wrong?"

He expects a, "I'm bored," or a, "You outta know. You're the one who landed us here, half-bit." At least a, "Shut your face you glitch." But it doesn't happen. Sunny gives no response. He doesn't move. He doesn't speak. He's just silent. Sideswipe finally does the one thing he's been avoiding and actually looks over at his brother.

Sunny is on the floor across from Sideswipe, back to the wall, legs drawn up and arms folded. He's staring at the floor. His face is blank.

"Sunny," Sideswipe says.

No response.

"Hey."

Sideswipe scoots down and kicks his brother in the leg. Sunny jumps. His head snaps up, optics wide and unfocused. His gaze lands on Sideswipe. He stares.

"Sideswipe?" he says. He sounds terrible, voice rough, half static.

"No," Sideswipe says. "I'm the ghost of Vector Sigma. Of course it's me, idiot. What'd you do, hit your head?"

Sunny looks around their cell. His optics are still wide. He draws his legs in closer, folds in on himself.

"Where are we?" he says.

Sideswipe laughs.

"Wow, you really did hit your head. We're in the brig, glitch-face."

Sunny doesn't rise to the bait. He doesn't snarl, doesn't lunge forward to hit his brother. He sits there, unmoving.

"What are you doing here?" he says.

"What do you mean, what am I doing here?" Sideswipe says. "I'm always in here. What are _you_ doing here?"

Sunny doesn't smile. Sideswipe doesn't really expect him to. He does expect a roll of the optics or an insult. He gets neither. Sunny just stares.

"Come on," Sideswipe says. "What's with the silent treatment? How come you haven't tried to kick my aft, yet?"

"You shouldn't be here."

"Where else am I gonna be?"

Sunny shifts to hug his legs. His chin rests on his knees. Sideswipe rolls his optics.

"What's got into you?" he says.

"You should go."

Sideswipe tilts his head to stare at the neural-field over the only way into the cell.

"Go where?" he says. "Unless you've got the codes to take that thing down?"

Sunny's not even looking at him, anymore. His gaze is far away. Sideswipe sighs.

"I'm kidding," he says.

He lifts his foot to nudge his brother. Only Sunny pulls away. His expression is blank.

"Bro?" Sideswipe says.

He knows that look, that carefully neutral mask.

"Go away," Sunny says.

"What's wrong?"

Sideswipe abandons his bored slouch and leans forward. He lifts a hand. His fingers brush his brother's knee.

Sunny jerks away. The mask drops. For one nano-klik, Sideswipe sees past it, sees something wild and desperate.

"I said _go away_," Sunny says.

Sideswipe freezes. Sunny's face shutters back down, closes off. He turns his head to the side.

"Sun—"

"Go frag yourself."

Sideswipe scowls. "What's your problem?"

Sunny doesn't answer. He sits there, face hidden, silent.

"Oh, yeah," Sideswipe says. He leans back against the wall. "Classic Sunstreaker, right there."

"Just go away."

"No."

Silence.

"You just gonna sit there?" Sideswipe says.

Sunny does.

"Of _course_. That's your problem. Whenever anyone tries to talk to you, you turn around and bite their head off. Primus forbid anyone actually cares enough to want to get near you. And then you pull this slag. You just shut up and pretend nothing is going on until you slagging lose it and beat someone's face in. No wonder everyone's afraid of you."

He knows they're the wrong words the moment they leave his mouth. He knows when Sunny flinches and curls in even tighter.

Sideswipe winces. "Ah, frag. I'm sorry. I didn't mean that."

Sunny is a statue. Sideswipe doesn't even pick up anything through their bond.

"Sunshine—"

"They're afraid of me," Sunny says.

"No. It's not like that—"

"Yes it is. I can see how they look at me. They avoid me. Because you're right. I do terrible things."

"Sunny, it's not your fault. You're not… if you'd just take a chance…"

A small sound escapes his brother. It's a laugh. A quiet, bitter laugh.

"Even _you_ can't stand me," Sunny says.

It's like a punch to the face. Sideswipe's next words are knocked right out of his mouth. He can only sit there, feeling something small and horrible curling inside him.

Sunny shifts again, almost looking at Sideswipe.

"You should go," he says. "I'll stay here."

His optics aren't just blank, they're empty. Sunstreaker is empty. He's _broken_. And it's Sideswipe's fault.

He's failed Sunny. Their whole life, the whole war is nothing but a string of Sideswipe's failures. He'd let Sunny leave. Time and time again, he'd watched his brother go away. He'd never made a real effort to go after him. Not once. Not even when they were together, in the same room.

Sunny is broken. And so is Sideswipe.

He'd let Sunny go. He'd let them take him. He'd let the Autobots haul him off, let them send Sunny to some backwater planet where they had abandoned him. Just like Sideswipe did. And all because he was too much of a coward. Because he couldn't do the one thing Sunny needed him to do.

"No," he says.

"It's okay," Sunny says.

"It's not okay! How could it be? How is it okay for me to leave you here to rot?"

"Sideswipe—"

"No! It's _not okay_. I can't leave you. I won't. Not _again_. I'm your fragging twin. It's my _job_ to stay with you."

"No, it's not."

"_Yes_,it _is_," Sideswipe says.

Sunny looks at him. Sideswipe holds his gaze, feeling himself shaking.

"It's supposed to be you and me. And I fragged that up. That was my fault. Oh, you helped, I know. But I had a chance to fix it and I wouldn't take it. It's my fault you're here and I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

"Sides…"

The anger drains away. He doesn't have the energy to keep himself upright anymore. Sideswipe slumps against the wall. He reaches up to cover his face.

"I'm sorry," he says.

A muffled sound, hydraulics. Fingers touch his shoulder.

Sunstreaker has moved. He right there, next to Sideswipe, one hand on his shoulder. Sideswipe looks at him for a moment. Then, before he can think about it, he drags his brother down and envelopes him.

Sunny freezes. He's going to tear free, he's going to start shouting, he's going to box Sideswipe on the back of the head and demand Sideswipe get the slag off of him.

Sunny's arms creep up and wrap around Sideswipe. He leans in. Sideswipe closes his optics. He buries his face in Sunny's shoulder.

"I'm not going to leave you," Sideswipe says. "I'm never going to leave you again."

* * *

><p>Scorpinok advances slowly. He knows Hunter is trapped. Hunter can see it in the way he moves, picking his way across the deck as Hunter backs away. He's toying with him.<p>

And Sideswipe… he just lies on the floor, dark, unmoving.

_God_, Hunter thinks. _Oh god, no._

"There's nowhere for you to run," Scorpinok says. "We would tell you to stay still, but you seem particularly incapable of doing as you're told."

_Sideswipe, get up. You have to get up._

Even as he thinks it, he knows it's useless. He can see into his chest. It's dark and silent. And it's not just the awful hole punched through him, it's all of Sideswipe. He's still. Hunter has seen that kind of stillness before.

_No. We just got Sunstreaker back. You can't… not now._

He hits something and stumbles. It's a control console. His gaze snaps back to the bug. The Headmaster chitters; he snaps his pincers.

_Oh god._

He grabs the edge of the console with one hand. The other one doesn't work, it—

Hunter looks down at the pulse rifle his hand has turned into. He lifts it, takes aim at the bug's face.

One of the cannons spins toward him. He sees a flash. His hand jerks. He ducks, bends over backward on the console and slides down and around, staggers a few steps back and lifts the weapon again.

His hand isn't there. Hunter stares at the stump of his arm as it oozes pink energon. It's… it's gone. His whole hand, gun and all, is _gone_. And it _hurts_.

He tries not to scream as he folds over his mangled arm. The sound wrenches itself out of him anyways.

Scorpinok laughs. Except that he's a Headmaster. And it's not just a Transformer; there's a human in there, too, and he's laughing.

"You son of a _bitch_," Hunter says.

"Only half right," Scorpinok says.

His back hits a wall. There's nowhere else to go. The bug fills his vision, the image wavers on the visor over his human eyes. Liquid spills down, onto his cheeks. The pain fills his brain with yammering shock. It makes his knees go weak.

_Shit. Oh shit, it's gone, it's gone._

He can't move. Scorpinok skitters towards him and he can't move and the Headmaster is going to kill him. He's going to die if he just stands there, if he freezes. He's going to die.

He's going to die.

"Agh!" Hunter screams.

The missile launchers unfold onto his shoulders. He doesn't even aim. He just fires. Scorpinok moves. His own cannons fire. The air explodes. Heat slams into him. His visor goes dark. His teeth snap together and he crumples. All he hears is the noise, the roar of flame.

Vision returns. He sees darkness, smoke, fire—

Rushing purple. It hits him, picks him up and crushes him into the wall.

Hunter's mind blanks.

"That's it?" a voice says. Deep voice, metallic undertones to it. "You've destroyed so much and that's all you can do?"

Little pinpricks of light dance in his vision. He looks up, into a monstrous, metal face. Scorpinok.

The Headmaster shakes.

"You've _ruined_ us," he says. Hate chokes his voice. Hunter can almost _feel_ it radiating off of him. "You. A human. A _child_. We're going to have to start over, leave all our work, because of _you_."

His tail comes up. Not fast, not like Sideswipe. Scorpinok moves slow. He wants Hunter to see it. Hunter thrashes but Scorpinok has him pinned against the wall, his arms trapped at his sides.

_Oh god, oh god. God no!_

He kicks. He lifts his feet, tries to wrench free. The pincer tightens. Something inside his shell pops. A warning flashes in the corner of his vision.

The bladed tip of the stinger taps Hunter's chest.

_No, no, no!_

"Hmm," Scorpinok says. "No. That won't do, will it?"

The tips draws up, screeches across armor, up his chest, up his neck, over his chin.

"Because you don't have a spark," Scorpinok says. "Your weakness is right…"

It's stopped dead between Hunter's optics.

"Here," Scorpinok says.

"Fuck you!"

The tip digs in.

Hunter screams. Every vile thing he can think of. He kicks and twists and tries to press himself into the wall, tries to get away from the awful pressure as Scorpinok's tail digs into his outer armor. More alarms. His head makes a horrible groaning sound. He can feel plating buckling in, can feel the stinger burying into his metal face. A half an inch and that thing is going to come through the visor and into Hunter's flesh and blood head and he _can't_ get _away_.

"_No_ goddamnit!"

A blue flash. Hunter see's _through_ Scorpinok. He yelps and squeezes his eyes shut. A wave washes through him, all warm and tingly.

Scorpinok jerks. The pincer around Hunter loosens and he crashes to the floor. He opens his eyes as Scorpinok whirls toward the flash—

Something moves.

_No_, Hunter thinks. _Some__**one**__._

Red and black and silver. He's pushing up with one arm into a sprawl, his head down, moving slow, almost hesitantly.

"_What?_" Scorpinok says.

"Oh my god," Hunter says.

Sideswipe looks up.

The hole in his chest… it's not dark anymore. It's filled with a brilliant light, white hot, pulsing blue, all but bursting out of him.

"That's…" Scorpinok says.

Sideswipe tilts his head. He stares at Scorpinok. It's almost like he doesn't recognize him. His face is blank.

A peculiar sensation crawls down Hunter's spine. A sense of… not wrongness. It's not bad. It's something strange. Something is _off_. Sideswipe is different somehow.

"Sideswipe?" he says.

Sideswipe's gaze flicks to him. He studies Hunter.

"Yes," he says after a moment. "That's one of our names."

Phantom goose bumps prickle Hunter's scalp. That pulsing glow inside Sideswipe. It has to be his spark. Not the case, but the spark itself. And maybe… maybe not just Sideswipe's.

"_Sunstreaker?_"

Sideswipe smiles. But it's not Sideswipe's smile. Hunter has seen this expression before, on another Autobot. It's more of a smirk.

"Im_poss_ible," Scorpinok says.

_It's both of them. Both of them in one body at the same time. How can it be both of them?_

Sideswipe lifts his hand, wiggles his fingers. He looks around the room. His feet move. He makes a _whuff_ sound.

"No," Scorpinok says slowly. "No. We… we must have missed. A slight miscalculation, that's all. A simple error."

Hunter edges along the wall, away from the Headmaster.

Sideswipe—_Sunstreaker? They?_—bend his legs. He pushes up onto his knees, he lets out a strangled noise and his hand comes up to his chest. He's leaking. He stares at the energon on his fingers. He looks baffled.

Scorpinok clicks his pincers. His tail twitches.

"Yes, that's all," he says. "The angle must have been wrong. But you can barely move, now. We assure you, we will not miss again."

The ion cannons next to his tail hum. He's not taking chances this time. He's going to shoot Sideswipe.

Hunter has no more weapons. He's got one hand. Scorpinok's back end faces him. He's turned completely away, his attention focused on Sideswipe. He's tall, his back is a good six feet over Hunter's head. The tail, though…

No time. He can't think about how stupid this is. All he knows is that if he doesn't do something fast, they're all going to die.

Hunter takes two, running steps and leaps. His arms stretch out. He sees the tail, the armor chinks, the small gaps between them.

He hits. Fingers scrabble for purchase, slide between two of the plates and squeeze.

Gravity pulls him. His arm strains. Scorpinok's armor digs into his fingers and all he can do is hold on.

Scorpinok jerks his tail up. Hunter flies through the air, sees Scorpinok's legs, the floor above him.

He falls.

"Whagh!"

Hunter lands on his stomach on top of Scorpinok's tail, right between the cannons.

"_What?_" Scorpinok says.

Hunter scrambles to find something to hang onto. He wedges himself between the cannons.

"Get _off_!" Scorpinok says.

His tail whips overhead. Hunter realizes his mistake as the stinger hovers over him. And then it plunges towards him. Hunter throws himself back, toward the tail. His feet slip. He reaches out, wraps an arm around the base and hangs on.

"Vermin!"

The ship tilts. Hunter flies out behind Scorpinok. He almost loses his grip. Scorpinok snarls.

Hunter twists around and catches sight of red just as Sideswipe buries his fist into the bug's face. His arm is a solid mass of metal. Scorpinok's face crunches.

"Agh!"

The Headmaster rears up. Hunter hooks one leg over the tail as the room spins. He closes his eyes. Then Scorpinok lands with a jolt. Hunter looks up, through Scorpinok's churning legs just in time to see Sideswipe's feet disappear.

_Huh?_

"Ragh!"

Scorpinok shakes again, a full body thrash, and it's all Hunter can do to hold on. Pincers snap like mad. Hunter can hear them. He's trying to grab something. Metal crunches. Something tears. Scorpinok screams.

Hunter has to do something. He can't just hang there, not like that, with one hand. He eyeballs the ground.

A hand latches onto his wrist. Hunter looks up. Sideswipe is crouched on Scorpinok's haunches, a grin on his face that isn't quite Sideswipe and isn't quite Sunstreaker.

"Great idea," he says. "But you'll miss all the fun back here."

Sideswipe drags him up. Hunter flops onto Scorpinok's back and scrambles up, after the 'bot. Something smacks the back of his head hard enough to knock him down. He tastes copper.

Sideswipe drags him up again. For one second, Hunter stares right into that hole in his chest. The glow is blinding. There's movement in there, something swirling, and he feels very small and helpless and kind of sick looking at it.

"Distract him," Sideswipe says.

Hunter blinks. Sideswipe's face is right there, inches from his own. He doesn't remember that happening.

"Down!"

Hunter is thrown to the side. Scorpinok's cannons fire. The heat is terrible. The air shrieks.

"_Listen_," Sideswipe says, dragging him close. "We've got a plan. You need to distract him."

"We." Not I, _we_. Hunter shudders.

"How?" he says.

Sideswipe smiles. It's not a comforting expression. He places a hand on Hunter's chest and pushes. Hunter falls, spins around, and almost gets gutted by a cannon.

"Son of a bitch!" he says.

Sideswipe is gone, dodging Scorpinok's pincers, headed for the head. The ion cannon to Hunter's right pivots towards him. Hunter grabs it and yanks; the shot goes wide.

_What did I just do?_

The tail slams into Hunter's shoulder. He pitches to the side, arms waving. The deck of the ship lurches. He manages to catch himself before he falls.

Scorpinok screeches.

Sideswipe digs at the Headmaster's neck. The stinger lifts up. It's long enough to reach the Autobot. Hunter staggers to his feet. The tail rushes down. He jumps.

He smacks into it just behind the stinger. His body swings out and the tail drops and the floor and the walls blur together as it whips back up. Hunter is flung into the air. The tail _writhes_.

Sideswipe snarls something and Hunter can hear the sheer glee in it.

"_Filthy abomination!_" Scorpinok shrieks.

Streaks of red and purple and green. Hunter's not sure if he's upside down or right-side up.

_Do __**not**__ let go._

Scorpinok rears up, onto his back legs. Hunter sees gray, the wall, coming right at him—

"Agh!"

Impact. His grip loosens. The tail slips from his grasp. He clutches at it but it pulls away and Hunter finds himself flying.

Until Sideswipe snatches him out of the air. The two of them go down in a tumble of limbs and a spray of sparks.

"Ugh," Sideswipe says. "Bad idea."

"Ow," Hunter says.

"I will KILL YOU!" Scorpinok says.

They've landed between Scorpinok's shoulder blades. Sideswipe presses Hunter's head down. A pincer darts overhead inches from Hunter's nose.

"Blades!" Sideswipe says.

"What?"

A hot blast scorches the side of Hunter's face. He clings to Scorpinok's back.

"That body has blades! In the arms!"

Hunter looks at the silver panels over his forearms. Like with the interface jack, like with the rocket launchers and targeting systems and the internet in his brain, as soon as he thinks it, it happens. Two knives pop out of his arms, starting at the wrists and curving back and ending in glittering points at his elbows.

"Get ready," Sideswipe says.

"For what?"

A rush of purple. Air whistles. Sideswipe tucks and rolls to the right. At the last second he reaches out and wraps his arms around Scorpinok's tail and wedges himself and the stinger down.

"Cut it!"

But Sideswipe can't dodge, not while holding that tail. And Scorpinok reaches up. A purple pincer latches onto Sideswipe.

"Got you," Scorpinok says.

Blades on his arms. Blades on his arms and how does he—

"Agh!"

The pincer tightens. Something inside Sideswipe breaks. His back arches. But he doesn't let go.

Chinks in the armor. Exposed wires. The inner workings of the tail.

Hunter throws himself onto it. His right arm hacks and slashes. Energon sprays out. He can feel it running down his face, thick liquid tingling on metal skin. Scorpinok bellows. And Hunter doesn't stop. He saws the blade back and forth, feels it bite into, through wiring and fluid lines and metal—

_Crack!_

The stinger flops. Hunter stumbles. The tail wrenches and he grabs for it and Sideswipe shouts something. Neural wires stretch and snap as the tail rips away, leaving a torn, leaking stump.

Scorpinok makes an odd, gasping groan. His body shivers. The pincer squeezing Sideswipe falls away.

Hunter crouches there, watching the severed thing twitch and quiver along Scorpinok's back. It's lying in a pool of energon. Hunter has energon all over his arms, on his face. He's _covered_ in it.

Sideswipe pulls the stinger out from beneath Hunter. He lifts it up, holds it like a spear. He takes three steps to Scorpinok's neck. The armor there is broken, peeled back to reveal circuitry and gears and alien machinery.

_We have a plan_, he'd said.

Sideswipe hefts his makeshift weapon over his head.

"Told you we'd kill you," he says. His face is a mask of manic, ferocious glee.

Right then, looking at that, Hunter knows what fear is.

The stinger slams into Scorpinok's neck. It punctures through plating and armor, severs coolant and energon lines, skewers the struts holding a human Headmaster to his robotic body. Scorpinok goes slack. Hunter pitches to the side as he collapses.

He hits the floor on his side and skids. Sideswipe manages to keep his feet beneath him and staggers to a stop next to Hunter.

Scorpinok lets out a hitching, keening wail. His six needle-legs twitch for a moment and go still, stump of a tail limp, one of his pincers folded under him.

"What," he says, "what did you do?"

"Cut the relays," Sideswipe says. He's grinning.

Scorpinok lies there, on his side. Nothing moves. His severed stinger sticks out of his neck. He looks like a harpooned whale stranded on a beach.

Sideswipe looks down at Hunter. "You okay?"

Scorpinok's body makes an awful, low-pitched grind. The head jerks to one side. Hunter recognizes the sound: he's trying to disengage. The human in there is trying to detach.

"Won't work," Sideswipe says. "We mangled you good. You're not going anywhere."

He says it with such satisfaction. Sunstreaker's hard sneer plays on his face.

"What did you _do_?" Scorpinok says. His head twitches.

His neck, the clamps that hold the human in place, try to twist and unlock. The very thing holding Hunter up, keeping him together, reduced to a sad, quivering pile of machinery on the floor.

"Take this out of us!" Scorpinok says.

Sideswipe is next to Hunter again, one hand under Hunter's arm. He helps Hunter to his feet.

"We gotta go," Sideswipe says.

"Take this out!"

"Come on, Hunter."

Sideswipe tugs his arm, pulls him towards the door.

"What about him?" Hunter says.

Sideswipe doesn't even look back. "Forget him. He's fragged. We need to go."

"Why? What's—"

"The engines," Sideswipe says. "Sideswipe set them to detonate right before slag-face got through. We don't have time."

"No!" Scorpinok says. "You can't leave us here!"

Hunter looks back. The Headmaster has managed to twist his head enough to look at them.

"We can and are," Sideswipe says.

"Don't leave me! Hunter, please!"

Hunter ducks his head.

"Please! Please, I'm like you. My name is Abraham. Please, Hunter, don't leave me here. I can help you!"

Sideswipe breaks away to lean down and pick something up. When he stands, he's holding Sunstreaker's blackened head. He studies it for a moment, his face impossible to read. Then he tucks it close.

"We're alike," Scorpinok, or the human Headmaster, says. "You and me, we're the same."

"No you're not," Sideswipe says without turning around.

They're at the doors. To Hunter's right is a pool of energon where Sideswipe had almost died—maybe did die. It's the same stuff crusting Hunter's arms and face.

"_Please_."

Sideswipe climbs through the ragged hole in the doors. Metal clangs as hit feet set down on the other side. He reaches in and holds out his hand.

"Let's go," he says.

"Hunter," Scorpinok says.

Hunter grabs the edge of the hole and swings a leg over.

"No!"

Sideswipe catches him with his shoulder, helps him down. Hunter slides to the floor. Sideswipe claps him on the arm and then takes off down the hall. Hunter pauses for one second. He closes his eyes. Then he heads after him.

Scorpinok's screams echo through the ship the whole way.

* * *

><p>I had so much fun writing that chapter. So, so much fun. Thanks to lildevchick, Starfire201, Paleodex, and Jessica Wolfe for your past reviews (and sorry for not addressing you guys earlier-I'm moving cross-country in a week and have been super busy and freaking out, so yeah). And thank you KayDeeBlu for being a wonderful beta.<p>

Also, over 100,000 words! Booyah!

Next chapter: Hang On


	23. Hang On

**Chapter Twenty-Three: Hang On**

"Where are we going?" Hunter says, trying to ignore the way Sideswipe is wheezing or the way his own feet drag.

"Cargo bay."

Which makes sense, until Hunter remembers the "punch the engines and head up" part. The engines, which are still vibrating throughout the ship.

"Why?" Hunter says.

Sunstreaker's head is nestled in the crook of Sideswipe's elbow while his hand tries to hold his chest together. It's not working. He's dribbling down his front and leaving a trail on the floor.

"We've gotta get off the ship," Sideswipe says.

They take a right. The walls are burnt where Scorpinok had shot at them; where he'd tried to kill them. Hunter glances at Sideswipe, at that hair-raising glow bursting out of him.

"We're gonna orbital jump?" Hunter says.

Sideswipe shakes his head before Hunter even finishes his sentence. "No time. And Sideswipe broke his jack when frag-face shot the console."

He keeps doing that, referring to himself as "Sideswipe." Or "we."

Hunter shivers.

A left turn. The cargo bay is right ahead. Hunter sees sunlight. Then they're through the doors. Sideswipe slows and sways. Hunter steps forward to catch him before he can land on his face.

The room is big and empty. The doors are still open. The floor ramps down into open air. Or would, anyway, if there were any.

Because they're in space.

Hunter stares at the curve of the earth. He can see where the blue atmosphere fades to black. Half of the planet's surface is covered in clouds, but he can still see directly below, the great swathe of shoreline. Lake Michigan sparkles silver.

Hunter stops dead in his tracks. Sideswipe lurches, stumbles, and manages to keep himself from tripping and rolling down the ramp.

"What the slag?" he says.

Hunter doesn't answer. He can't answer.

It doesn't look real. Even though he knows it is, he knows he's staring down at a chunk of the American Midwest, his brain refuses to accept it.

"Let's _go_," Sideswipe says. He nudges Hunter with his shoulder.

"We're in space," Hunter says.

"No, we're not."

"Yes, we are."

"No, it's—"

"I know what space looks like, Sideswipe! I can see the atmosphere. We're in space!"

Sideswipe cocks his head to the side. He looks outside the ship.

"Actually, we're not," he says. "We're not even halfway there, technically."

Hunter stares.

"Come on," Sideswipe says. "The engines are gonna hit critical any time now. Do you want to be here for that?"

It's not just the view his brain refuses to process. Sideswipe watches him, waiting. Hunter looks outside. A horrible suspicion tickles the back of his mind.

"What are we doing in here?" he says.

Sideswipe grins at him. He jerks his head towards the ramp.

_But there's nothing out there. There's no ship or parachutes or—_

"No," Hunter says. "No way. That's… even _you_ are not that crazy."

Except that he is. Sideswipe takes a few steps down the ramp and says, "Come on."

Hunter starts to back away. "No. Oh no. This is insane. You can't be serious."

Sideswipe actually rolls his eye.

"We don't have time for this, human," he says.

"Don't have time for what? You want to jump out? How the hell is that any better than getting blown up?"

"We have a plan."

"All your plans _suck_!"

Sideswipe stands there for a moment longer. Then his shoulders droop. He trudges back up the ramp.

"Listen," he says. "You're new at this. We get that. But sometimes—"

Sideswipe's foot slams into Hunter's knee. Before he can even throw up his hands to catch himself, Sideswipe tackles him.

"What are you _doing_?" Hunter says.

Sideswipe tangles his legs with Hunter's. He twists. Hunter rolls over him and lands five feet closer to the edge of the ramp.

"Stop it!" Hunter says.

Sideswipe drags his foot up and kicks. Hunter rolls. He reaches out, claws at the deck. Metal screeches and sparks fly. Then Sideswipe is on him again, pushing and pulling, wrestling him toward the edge of certain death.

Hunter takes a swing at him. Sideswipe ducks. They slide another few feet.

"Stop," Sideswipe says. His shoulder digs into Hunter's side. "Trying." Hunter scrabbles and kicks and flails. His fingers gouge into Sideswipe's armor. "To fight!" Hunter is on his stomach, his right stump flailing in the air.

"No!" he says.

"Go!" Sideswipe says.

His legs swing out into empty space. Hunter claws at the ramp as Sideswipe wraps his legs around Hunter's torso and throws himself off, as Hunter slides, feels the deck give way beneath him, as gravity grabs him. The lip of the ramp is right there. He can see the rubber-like seal around the edge.

The ramp pulls out of his grasp. His hand clutches on emptiness. For a second, it hangs there, the cargo bay lit up in the sunlight. Then it falls away.

The cold hits. Hunter tries to gasp. He makes a sputtering noise. His limbs freeze up. The ship pulls farther and farther away, getting smaller and smaller.

There's no sound. No rushing air, no wind. They just hang there, on the cusp of blue, whirling around and around, from dark space, to white and blue planet, and back again. Sunlight glints off his armor.

Sideswipe still has a hold of him. His head digs into Hunter's back.

((There,)) he comms. ((Not so bad, is it?))

((AAAH!)) Hunter says.

Sideswipe shifts. Sunstreaker's head bumps into Hunter's side. He starts to inchworm his way up Hunter's frame.

They spin. The dark sky and the earth whirl around and around in a freakish kaleidoscope of _dear god we're going to die!_ A pinpoint of yellow light, far above. The ship is no more than a dot.

A flash. Hunter doesn't hear anything. Clouds, the earth, a glimmer of water so far below. Brown and green patches of land. Blue sky, inky darkness, and then a spreading, orange and yellow and pink ball of fire where the ship had been.

Sideswipe lets out a whoop of laughter.

((There it goes!))

There it goes. Sideswipe's only way off the planet. Their only place to hide, all blown to smithereens with Scorpinok's Headmaster body and its human pilot, all vaporized and scattered across the sky.

The way he and Sideswipe will be spattered across Michigan when they hit.

((We're gonna die!)) Hunter says.

((Maybe,)) Sideswipe says.

The earth is flattening out. From one horizon to the other, that curve begins to disappear.

_Terminal velocity_. That word pops into his head. _The maximum speed a falling object reaches._

Robotic shell or no, crazy healing abilities or no, he's going to plow face-first into Wisconsin going over two hundred miles an hour.

((It's not maybe!)) Hunter says.

((Just grab on when we tell you to.))

The lake stretches out below. It fills out his view. It looks so pretty from up there, so peaceful.

The first rush of wind. A faint whistling at first. Then it tugs at him.

((Sideswipe?))

((Hang on.))

The air roars. The wind hits him, rattles his armor, tears at his limbs. They're sent spinning all over again. It tries to pry Sideswipe off of him.

Metal rasps together. Sideswipe moves, pulls himself around. Hunter looks down and finds Sideswipe right there, face-to-face.

_Don't look down, don't look down. Don't look at it._

The pulsing glow is worse up close. It shines out of the ragged hole in Sideswipe's chest, throbbing hot on Hunter's armor. It makes his skin crawl.

((Take this,)) Sideswipe says. He holds out Sunstreaker's head. ((Do _not_ let go of it.))

Like Sideswipe, Hunter only has one hand now. He has to cradle the head against him. As soon as Sideswipe's arm is free, he wraps it around Hunter in a sort of one-armed hug and detangles his legs from Hunter's.

((Hold onto us,)) he says.

_For when we bounce after impact?_

Sideswipe wraps his legs tight around Hunter's waist. Sunstreaker's head presses between them. Hunter wants to be weirded out. He wishes he had the brain-space to be weirded out. Instead, his mind is too busy screaming, "Oh god! Are those cities?"

They fall. Hunter knows, he _knows_ that it takes a few minutes to drop that far. They're a long way up and they only fall so fast. But it doesn't look like the ground is changing at all. Then they pass through clouds and Hunter realizes that the funny lines he sees are roads—tiny, microscopic lines twisting through green and he can see cities. The sky is no longer black but blue. And they're falling fast, so fast, whirling and whipping around.

((Hang on tight!)) Sideswipe says. ((We'll see if this thing still works!))

Hunter is right there, right next to that psychotic grin. Because that's what it is. It's not an expression of happiness. There is no amusement on Sideswipe's face. Hunter imagines that is the look an ax-murderer wears right before he lops someone's head off. It's a manic, teeth-baring kind of glee.

((Oh god,)) Hunter says.

A rumble starts in Sideswipe's back. It rattles through his frame, through Hunter's arms and Sideswipe's legs, shaking his teeth in his skull.

_What the…?_

Heat washes over his shins, warm at first and then hot and then burning. He can hear it over the rush of wind, a low roar.

((You have a rocket on your back?)) Hunter says.

((Jet pack.))

Tiny moving dots on the road: cars.

Gravity tugs at Hunter where Sideswipe has wrapped himself. It pulls at his innards. He hugs the Autobot for dear life.

((You can land us?)) Hunter says.

((If it lasts that long.))

They're so high up. So high, that if they kept falling, they wouldn't burst on impact, they'd bounce.

Something inside Sideswipe shifts. The 'bot tenses. Pain flashes across his face. Hunter doesn't ask if he's alright. He doesn't need to. And it doesn't matter because if Sideswipe stops, if that jet pack fails, they'll die. All he can do is cling to the Autobot and hope.

They fall feet-first. The earth is flat again. The tiny cars below have colors.

The jet pack coughs. Gravity disappears and the horizon wobbles. The pack kicks back on. Hunter's legs fly out of their own accord as he slips.

((Hang _on_,)) Sideswipe says.

((I'm trying!))

He risks a glance down. They're coming in over a forest. A road cuts through on the left. He can make out the trees.

_Oh god._

The jet pack sputters. Lurches. The treetops are rough beneath them, the size of a fingernail. They're only a couple of hundred feet up.

Sideswipe's chest makes a sickening gurgle. He lets out a pained wheeze. His limbs lock up.

((Sideswipe?))

The roaring sputters, flares once, twice, tries to recover. And then it cuts off.

((_Sideswipe_?))

((Brace!))

The trees are the size of coins, of quarters. They have seconds.

They're going to hit. It's going to be hard. Sideswipe is already broken; he's leaking. The impact will kill him. But Hunter isn't a giant robot; he's just the head. His body is a shell. Not a good one, and he knows he's not big enough to make much of a difference, but it might be enough, he might be able to absorb enough of the impact.

Hunter throws his legs out and arches his back so he's between Sideswipe and the ground.

((What are you—)) Sideswipe says.

The first tree hits like a locomotive. His shoulder jerks. Hunter thinks he screams. The rest—

Green. Rush of leaves and pain. Branches breaking, clawing, tearing at him. Then he's down, through the leaves and the ground rushes up—

Everything hurts. It fills his mind, chews through his brain.

A hissing, ticking sound. His face is wet. Wind in the trees.

Fading in and out. The silence. Tentative bird song. Thudding in the air.

_Helicopter?_

He tries to open his eyes but it's too hard. He'd be sick if he knew where his stomach was.

_Sideswipe? Where…_

"—kid? Hey!"

Hands on him. Warm hands. Squishy hands on his face, his human face.

"—then you get on that phone and you get a medical team—no. I don't care. I want them here _now_. This isn't—"

_Sunstreaker's head. I gotta…_

He croaks something. His voice comes out all garbled and hissing.

"That's it, wake up."

That voice is familiar. He can't think of the name, but he knows it.

"Sssw," Hunter says.

_Sideswipe? Is Sideswipe okay? Am __**I**__ okay?_

"He's here, kid. Mostly. You just hang on, alright? We're—Hunter? Hey, no no no. Don't you _dare_—"

It's too much. He's too tired. He can't…

* * *

><p><em>- Three days later -<em>

Birds chirp in the trees. Dew glistens on leaves just beginning to lose their summer green. Three, heavily-armed black hawk helicopters buzz overhead. Agent Seymour Simmons walks the last few feet to the medical tent and ducks through the canvas flap.

The inside is a few degrees warmer. Fluorescent lights hang on stands set up along the walls. He has to watch his step—extension cords snake across the floor—as he makes his way further in, past a table and folding chairs to the other entrance, the one that leads to the heart of the complex.

It's even warmer in there. There are no tables in this room, just a couple of chairs and a pile of metal in the center.

Hunter looks up as he enters. He's still pale, still has dark spots under his eyes. It's a huge improvement; at least he's awake.

"Still bad out there?" Hunter says.

"It's a goddamn circus," Simmons says. He stirs his coffee and takes a swig.

Outside, he can hear the choppers and further, growling diesel engines. Every now and then a shouted order. And below it all, a low din of noise.

"How's he doing?" Simmons says.

Hunter glances at the unmoving pile and sighs. Or approximates the sound, anyway.

"The same," the kid says.

"He said anything yet?"

Hunter shakes his head. "I don't even know if he can hear us."

They both stare for a while. There are still patches of red and silver. Some black. But every day the rash of gray spreads a little more. Every day the kid stands watch, waiting. Every day, Simmons comes by to make sure he hasn't dropped.

"You look terrible, kid," he says. "You get any sleep?"

Hunter barks a laugh. He's slumped in one of the metal folding chairs, elbows on his knees, the chair sagging underneath his weight. A bitter half-smile twists on his lips.

"I don't even do that anymore," he says.

"Yeah, well, you need to take a break."

Hunter shrugs. "Nothing much to do in here except surf the internet."

Simmons arches an eyebrow.

One of the black hawks flies right overhead and for a few seconds, all Simmons can hear is the _thwock_ of rotors.

It's stuffy in that tent. Even unconscious—or whatever it is giant robots are when they're not awake—the NBE, alias "Sideswipe," puts out a lot of heat. Though that might just be because he's all cracked open.

Simmons considers loosening his tie.

"So why are you here?" Hunter says.

"What, I gotta have a reason to check up on you?"

The kid stares.

"Yeah, alright. I'm here to give you a heads up."

"For what?" Hunter says with a definite edge in his voice.

Simmons tries to hide his wince behind another mouthful of coffee. The way the kid looks at him, he doesn't think he succeeds.

"Some people are coming by," he says.

"Uh huh."

"Some of the higher-ups, couple of Defense Department jockeys. The usual."

"The usual?"

"Look, kid. You been here three days now. Red isn't getting any better—"

"So?"

"So I'm just saying. It's time to start thinking about your options, all right?"

The kid's jaw works. He looks away, his gaze fixing on the twisted pile of wreckage.

"I've been doing my best to give you that chance," Simmons says. "Three days, I've managed to keep these people at bay. Three days, my team has managed to keep this site secure. You know how hard it is to set up a place like this? You know how hard it is to keep the media sharks and the whack-job crazies out of here? There are limits. And we have met them."

"These people, what are they coming here for?"

Simmons doesn't have to say anything.

"_Shit_," Hunter says. "They're gonna move him, aren't they? They're gonna drag him off, open him up—"

"Kid—"

"It's just like Machination, all over again. I _told_ him—"

"_Kid_—"

"It'll kill them, Simmons. If they move them right now, it's gonna _kill_ them. _Both_ of them. They're not…"

_They shouldn't be alive_, he means. Robots or no, by all logic, anything that torn up shouldn't be alive.

"Maybe it's for the best," Simmons says.

Hunter is out of his chair so fast Simmons barely sees it.

"_No_," he says. "They lay so much as a finger on them and I'll—"

"You'll do _what_," Simmons says. "Declare war on the U.S. government? On humanity? You gonna throw in with those Decep-whatevers?"

Simmons hears metal creak. The kid's fists tremble.

"I know he's your friend and all—"

Hunter's lips twitch.

"—but you've got to be realistic here. You're fast and you're mean—don't give me that look—but you can't take on everyone. Sometimes, you've gotta make the shit decision."

Hunter opens his mouth, no doubt to deliver some scathing remark, and freezes. He stands like that, jaw slack, gaze distant, for a few seconds. Then his jaw snaps shut. His eyes widen.

"What?" Simmons says.

"It's," Hunter says. "It's a transmission."

* * *

><p>A ping in Hunter's brain. Not a sound, not an alert. He's just aware of it, like a scratch behind his ear only it's in his brain. The visor comes down and lights up. And there, scrolling in the bottom, right corner of his vision, is a message. It's in English, but it makes no sense—a jumble of letters and numbers.<p>

"Transmission?" Simmons says. "From who?"

"I don't know," Hunter says. He looks over to Sideswipe, looks at the pulsing, blue light leaking out of the cracks.

There are only three sources he can think of: Machination, the Decepticons, or…

He focuses on the message. He hears a click, a burst of static, and then silence.

((Hello?)) he comms.

Silence. A few soft clicks.

((Hello? Is anyone there?))

((Who is this?)) a voice says. ((How did you access this channel? Submit your identification codes immediately.))

"Kid?" Simmons says.

Hunter waves him off.

((This is Hunter O'Nion,)) he says.

A pause. Then, ((_Hunter?_))

Only now does he recognize it. It's been six weeks since he heard that voice, but he knows that Autobot.

((Bumblebee?)) he says.

((Primus, Hunter, what are you—how—where are you? What's going on down there? We can't reach—))

((Whoa, slow down. Listen, Sideswipe's been hurt. Like, really bad. Where are you guys?))

((We're—))

He cuts off. A burst of static and then a new voice comes on the line.

((You claim to be the human, Hunter O'Nion?)) Prowl says.

((Uh, yeah?)) Hunter says.

((How do you have access to this communication line? Are you still on board the Ark-23?))

((No. It… we sort of blew it up.))

A long pause. Then, ((Explain.))

((It's a really long story,)) Hunter says. ((Like I told Bumblebee, Sideswipe's messed up. I don't think he's going to last very long and a bunch of military cronies could be here any minute—))

((Hunter, you need to calm down. I need information before I can act. Tell me what's happened.))

((Machination happened,)) he says. ((It was headed by a Decepticon named Scorpinok. Sideswipe and I managed to get into one of their facilities and we got Sunstreaker—his head and his spark—out. But Scorpinok came after us. He got onboard the ship. We blew it up.))

((Scorpinok is dead?)) Prowl says.

((His Headmaster is.))

The silence sounds like suspicion.

((The Decepticon Scorpinok was a Headmaster?)) Prowl says.

((He _was_.))

((And the rest of him was destroyed?))

((No. We haven't… he kicked our asses. We barely got off the ship. We had to jump, without parachutes. And Sideswipe's jet pack didn't make it all the way to the ground and he hasn't moved in three days and if you guys don't get your asses down here, he and Sunstreaker are gonna die.))

((Where are you?)) Prowl says.

((Michigan. Look, it'll be easy to find us. Just turn on the news.))

((_The humans know of you?_))

((We gouged out a crater in the middle of a national park,)) Hunter says. ((People tend to notice that sort of thing. The giant, nuclear fireball in the sky was a pretty big tip-off.))

Plus the warehouse in Detroit. That is all _over_ the internet. CNN keeps playing the footage over and over, Hunter crawling out of the wreckage, waving his arms, crunching down into a Lamborghini. It went viral fifteen seconds after hitting Youtube.

((Hunter,)) a new voice says. A deeper voice, an older voice. ((This is Optimus Prime. What is your location?))

Hunter throws open Google and finds his GPS coordinates.

((And are you safe?)) Optimus says.

"Simmons, how long until your bosses show up?" Hunter says.

"About twenty minutes," Simmons says.

((For the next ten minutes,)) Hunter says.

* * *

><p>Nine minutes later he's outside with Simmons, standing in the bright sunlight, staring up through the trees. Military helicopters circle overhead. He can spot other ones, civilians, circling like vultures a few miles out. The whole complex—a modified battlefield hospital tent—is ringed with big coils of barbed wire. Humvees and armed soldiers—real ones, not just Simmons's government lackeys—patrol through the trees. All of this is held within another ring of spike-tipped fences and more razor-wire. Beyond that is a swirl of movement and noise. He doesn't have to magnify his vision to know it's a massive crowd of people.<p>

"Holy shit," he says.

"Yeah," Simmons says. "It's a goddamn security nightmare."

The tent itself takes up most of the clearing Hunter and Sideswipe made when they landed. He and Simmons have to stand next to a tree to leave enough room.

"You managed all of this for three days?" Hunter says.

Simmons sips his coffee. "Not my first rodeo, kid."

They wait. The soldiers milling around on the inner ring keep glancing their way. They've got good grips on their weapons, but Hunter doesn't see any fingers on triggers. Yet.

"You'd better be right about this," Simmons says.

"You'd better be right, too," he says. "If someone starts shooting…"

Simmons flaps his hand.

"It's not them I'm worried about," Simmons says.

Hunter notices it first: a humming in the air. A whiff of burning. He straightens. Simmons glances over and then his eyes lock on the empty space in front of them. Green streaks the air.

The background noise fades away. Hunter can barely hear the helicopters. All his attention is focused on that patch of dirt next to the tent. He feels more than hears the _pop!_

Simmons takes a step back. Several soldiers lift their guns.

Three Autobots fill the clearing. They're huddled together, weapons out and primed, a cluster of red and white and black and yellow.

Silence. No one moves. Beside him, Simmons's pulse doubles.

_Okay_, Hunter thinks. _Here goes._

He steps forward. All eyes, organic and not, fix on him.

"Hey," he says.

For two seconds, the Autobots stare. The spot between Hunter's shoulder blades tingles. Any second now, someone is going to open fire. Any second, someone is going to do something stupid and why isn't anyone saying anything? Why are they just standing there? Why—

"Alright, that's enough," Ratchet says. His rifle folds back into his arm. Beside him, Bumblebee doesn't quite sag in relief. Prowl lowers his weapon but doesn't put it away.

Ratchet pushes past the two of them and takes three steps to kneel in front of Hunter. He lifts his hand. A wave of warm and tingling washes over him and Hunter takes a step back.

"Easy there," Ratchet says. "I'm just running a diagnostic on you."

Hunter catches Bumblebee waving at him. He waves back.

"Wow," the yellow 'bot says. "What happened to you?"

Ratchet beats him to it with, "A lot."

Simmons clears his throat. Prowl's head snaps in his direction. His eyes lock onto the agent.

"Are you going to make introductions?" Simmons says to Hunter. "Or am I going to have to get creative with the nicknames?"

And then Ratchet fills Hunter's vision.

"Are you in any pain?" the medic says.

"No," Hunter says, trying to lean past him, trying to see what everyone is doing, where Simmons is going. But Ratchet lifts a hand and stops him. Hunter sighs. "I've been getting kind of tired. It's not a big deal, though."

Ratchet rumbles. "I suspect you're low on energy. Is there some sort of refueling you can… intake?"

Hunter shrugs.

The expression that flashes across the Autobot's face is an odd mix of anger and sadness.

"It's happened before," Hunter says. "Like I said, it's not bad. Last time Sideswipe had me sit out in the sun for a while. It helped."

"That would work on a short-term basis. We'll have to figure out a long-term solution, however. Where is that idiot?"

Hunter points to the tent. Ratchet swivels around to look at it.

"Oh, that can't be good," he says. He stands up.

Simmons has moved to the middle of the clearing, his hands clasped behind his back, staring up at Prowl. Hunter can see the familiar glint in the man's eye, the oddball grin tugging at his features.

"—to let you know that I am not authorized to communicate," he says.

Prowl, his face completely blank, says, "And yet, here you are."

"To let you know that I can't," Simmons says.

Prowl stares. Simmons rocks back on his heels.

"Prowl," Ratchet says. "Or you, the human. I don't care. I need in there. Now."

Simmons eyebrows lift. He leans to the side to look past Prowl's legs to the tent. Then he turns to Hunter.

"This is your show, kid," he says.

"Yeah, yeah," Hunter says. He runs a hand down his face. "Deniability. I got it. Ratchet, can you just cut through it?"

Ratchet mutters something about "fragging politics." One of his fingers origamis itself into a thin, glowing blade. He doesn't walk over so much as shuffle to the side. A few, quick swipes and the canvas siding starts to flutter down.

Prowl and Bumblebee both edge to the side to give him room, coming to a stop next to Hunter, beneath the tree. Bumblebee keeps looking over, but he doesn't say anything.

"Deniability?" Prowl says. He watches Hunter from the corner of his eye, his face turned toward Ratchet.

"We thought it best," Hunter says. "That way Simmons doesn't get into trouble and none of his bosses can pitch a fit."

Prowl doesn't say anything for a minute. Ratchet peels back the ceiling of the tent.

"Yes," Prowl says. "That would be best."

He kind of twitches. Hunter almost doesn't see it and it takes even longer for him to recognize it.

_Was that… did he almost smile?_

It's gone before he can tell.

Ratchet lets out a hiss of Cybertronian. Hunter understands some of it. They're swear words.

The tent lies open, the siding lying in piles around the edges. Inside, the heap of metal glints in the morning sunlight. Ratchet sits back on his heels and swears again.

"What in the name of Primus did that moron _do_?" he says.

* * *

><p>So, there's only one more chapter left, which I'm going to post on Monday before I begin my Epic Road Trip (that way, if I get sideswiped by a semi and my car bursts into a ball of fire, I won't leave this thing uncompleted). Thank you Starfire and lildevchick for hanging in there this long. Thank you KayDeeBlu for slogging through this whole thing.<p>

Last chapter: It's Okay


	24. It's Okay

****AN: I lied. Moving sooner than expected, and I won't have internet from tomorrow out. So here's the last chapter of Ariadne's Thread.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Twenty-Four: It's Okay<strong>

Simmons would be lying if he said he wasn't impressed. It shouldn't be such a surprise how efficient they are; they're alien _robots_, for christ's sake. It takes less than five minutes for the red and white one to get everything squared away. It—he—descends on the mangled remains of Red with violent efficiency, slicing and dicing and peeling away bits of armor and machinery until it—he—exposes the glowing light inside.

The second he does this, the other two step back. The yellow one gets all fidgety and starts firing off what Simmons assumes are questions—it's in their native language and all Simmons hears is a torrent of noise: a deep, electric thrum with odd pulses, almost like music.

Even the black and white one gets all hesitant. Red-and-White snaps something back.

"What'd he say?" Simmons says.

"Beats me," Hunter says. He leans against the tree, his arms crossed over his chest. His gaze keeps darting around, landing mostly on the soldiers. Simmons doesn't think he realizes he's doing it. "Probably talking about their sparks."

"Uh huh," Simmons says. "For those of us _not_ so familiar with their physiology?"

"Seriously?" Hunter says. "I thought you were some kind of expert."

Simmons shrugs.

The kid stands there, studying him. Simmons doesn't like the look on his face, a shrewd kind of suspicion. Simmons looks away.

"Their sparks, the glowing things?" Hunter says. "They're not supposed to touch. According to Sideswipe, anyway. He said something about them exploding. Except that he and Sunstreaker are different. When Scorpinok… when he stabbed him, them, I think their sparks sort of combined. They were both in there when we fought him."

Hunter stares at the ground. He doesn't move. Simmons waits for him to continue but he doesn't.

Simmons sighs through his nose. It's hard to remember how young Hunter is. That robotic body of his makes him seem so much older, more dangerous. If he wanted to, Simmons has no doubt the kid could take on everyone inside this facility and walk away. Attached to the bigger body, he's got the combative power of a tank on two legs. The kid is a walking, talking, one-man army. And he's just that: a kid.

Red-and-White leans in over Red's remains. He reaches down. The other two NBE's block most of Simmons's view, so he only catches a glimpse as some sort of compartment opens up in Red-and-White's torso. He lifts cupped hands. Blue light throbs between his fingers. He makes a twisting motion as he brings his hands up and the light disappears. The compartment snaps shut.

"That's done it," Red-and-White says, in English this time. "They're contained. They can 'jump us up anytime."

"I guess this is it, huh?" Simmons says.

Hunter's head snaps up. He blinks.

"What?" he says.

"Looks like they're packing up," Simmons says.

"Oh."

"Hunter!" Yellow says. He waves the kid forward. "Come on, let's go!"

Hunter stands there.

"Go on, kid," Simmons says. "Unless you'd rather stay here?"

All three NBE's freeze. They all look past Simmons simultaneously. They're looking at the perimeter. Simmons glances over his shoulder.

"Oh," he says. "Time's up."

Hunter's visor is all lit up. Beneath it, his eyes move, his gaze fixes on Simmons.

"Wow," he says. "These guys weren't screwing around, were they?"

"Afraid not," Simmons says. "Go. I got this."

Hunter nods. He takes a few steps towards the waiting NBE's and then stops.

"Thanks," he says.

"Yeah," Simmons says. "I'd say it's been fun, but, well…"

Hunter snorts.

The air vibrates. It makes Simmons's teeth itch. He takes a few steps back, just in case, and retrieves his styrofoam cup from the ground. He peers in. There's a bug thrashing around on the surface of his coffee. Simmons frowns and flicks the remaining stuff out.

The air streaks around the NBE's. Simmons waves. Hunter returns the gesture.

The black and white NBE opens his mouth and says, "I thought you weren't authorized to communicate."

A patch of the universe implodes. Simmons is left blinking at the empty, shredded remains of the surgical tent, the stink of burnt air floating on the breeze.

"Son of a bitch," he says.

* * *

><p>Hunter wants to punch something. The three Autobots gathered around him stare. Ratchet squints at him with a mixture of disbelief and horror. Prowl looks like something in his head just broke. Even Optimus Prime has gone silent.<p>

"You… set it on fire," Prowl says.

"Yes," Hunter says. He squeezes his eyes shut and pinches the bridge of his nose, trying to quell his first ever headache in this cyborg body.

_Oh, lucky me._

"That's just _stupid_," Ratchet says.

"Yeah, Ratchet. I kind of figured that out, thanks. Sideswipe already gave me this lecture so could we please skip it?"

"You set it on fire," Prowl says in the same, dead monotone.

"Oh, for god's sake. _Yes_, I set an energon storage on fire. It blew up, we almost died, I _got it_. Bad move, okay? Moving on now?"

"Hunter," Ratchet says. He leans down so his face is level. "_Sideswipe_ knew it was a bad idea."

"I _know_."

"You," Prowl says. He hasn't moved. Hasn't so much as twitched.

Optimus shakes his head. He glances over at the black and white 'bot to his side.

"I think that will be all for now," he says. He lays a hand on Prowl's shoulder. "Come."

"Yes," Prowl says. His voice is distant. He shakes his head a couple of times.

"Hunter," Optimus says. "I'm glad to see you safe. We will need to speak again, but for now, please rest.

"Yeah," Hunter says. "Thanks."

Optimus bows his head. The doors hiss open and the two 'bots leave. Silence descends. Movement out of the corner of his eye and Hunter turns to find Ratchet crossing his arms. The medic doesn't say anything. Hunter tries, and fails, not to fidget.

"So," he says.

"So," Ratchet echoes.

"Why—"

"What in Primus's name were you thinking?"

"I didn't—"

"And it's not just you, is it? It's your entire, blasted species. The lot of you. Something is glitched in your collective processors."

Hunter doesn't even know how to respond.

Ratchet makes a grating noise. Hunter is bathed in tingly energy again.

"That body does not run on energon," Ratchet says.

Back in Detroit, when he woke up on the autopsy table—the water-cooler filled with the black stuff. That's what Hunter bleeds now. Goo.

"No," he says.

"I won't know until I run a few scans, but I'd hazard to say that it's some kind of liquid nutrient system. It's what's keeping your brain functioning, what's providing your organic tissue with oxygen. And it's being depleted. That's why you're tired."

Hunter doesn't say anything. He stares at the distant wall.

"I should be able to synthesize it, so you won't have to worry about that," Ratchet says.

Hunter nods. He's not sure whether the lump in his throat is real or not, if he even has the parts or not. The line where the wall meets the floor swims. Hunter blinks a few times.

Large, warm fingers close over his left side.

"We'll figure this out," the medic says.

Hunter starts to reply and thinks better of it. Ratchet keeps his hand there for a moment longer, long enough for Hunter to compose himself. Then he straightens.

"From what I can tell, you received no lasting damage from the fall," he says. "That doesn't mean you can go running around. I want you to take it easy. You let me know the second something feels off, got it?"

"Yeah," Hunter says. "Thanks, Ratchet."

"Of course."

Hunter blinks a couple of times and wipes at his face.

It's an eight-foot drop to the ground. Hunter hops off and lands in a crouch. He stands and eyeballs the other berth. Ratchet follows his gaze.

"Don't worry about them," he says. "They're stable enough for now. It's going to be a while before I get either of those glitch-heads up and walking around."

"Are they… is Sunstreaker…" Hunter says.

"We'll know once I bring them online. And that won't be anytime soon. You heard Prime. Go on, now. I'm not the only one glad to see you."

_What?_

Red and white. Someone gasps. Hunter whirls to see two very familiar faces hovering at the edge of the doorway.

"Verity," he says. "Jimmy."

Verity's hands cover her mouth and nose. Jimmy's eyes are wide.

"Dude," Jimmy says. "You look… different."

Hunter's stomach twists. But then Verity curls her hand into a fist and she punches Jimmy in the shoulder. Hard.

"Don't say that, asshole!" she says. "You're gonna make him feel bad."

"Ow! Geez, calm down. I didn't mean it like that!"

"Yeah, well, next time you open your mouth maybe you outta think about what's coming out of it, huh?"

Jimmy rubs his arm and gives her an incredulous scowl. Which Verity ignores. She breezes past him, into the room. Jimmy follows.

"You guys," Hunter says. "Uh, you look good."

And they do. They're dressed in matching sets of what look like white hospital scrubs. Verity's dark hair is free from its usual ponytail; it spills onto her shoulders in soft waves. Jimmy's bangs hang in his face but he doesn't seem to mind. They're both smiling at him.

"Come here," Verity says. She doesn't even wait for Hunter to respond before she reaches up and drags him into a hug. Jimmy's long arms wrap around them both.

Verity sniffs. When she pulls away, she's wiping at her cheeks. Jimmy's eyes are suspiciously moist.

"It's really good to see you," Hunter says.

"I'll bet," Verity says.

"Dude," Jimmy says. "What happened? Last we knew, you and that yellow guy were missing."

"It's a long story."

"Best told somewhere that _isn't_ my med-bay," Ratchet says.

"Yeah, yeah," Verity says. "We're leaving. Chill out."

She grabs Hunter's wrist and tugs him towards the door.

"Come on," she says. "They've got a whole room set up for us, this time. You can get on the internet on this giant wall monitor."

"Food's not so good, though," Jimmy says.

"Oh god. Would you stop complaining about that? Who cares about the food? We're in _space_, Jimmy, on a ship with giant, alien _robots_. It's totally worth it."

Jimmy looks at Hunter and rolls his eyes.

"Six weeks of this, man," he says. "Six weeks I gotta live with her. If you hadn't shown up, I might've thrown myself out the air-lock."

"Shut up," Verity says, only she's grinning and Jimmy is, too, and for the first time in a long while, Hunter feels it's okay to smile.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe wakes up to find Ratchet glaring down at him. This is nothing new. Sideswipe keeps a mental catalogue of responses for the occasion, each one depending on just how slagged off the medic looks. What <em>is<em> new is the sheer amount of quiet, seething rage. And the fact that Sideswipe can't move.

"Uh," he says.

"Give me one good reason," Ratchet says, speaking slowly and carefully, "why I shouldn't offline you and leave you to rust in a storage compartment for the next several deca-vorns."

The catalogue is no help at all. Sideswipe digs through his processor, trying to find some kind of explanation for the hostility. He finds nothing. He looks past the medic to the walls. He's in an Autobot med-bay—that much he recognizes. He knows the sound of spark monitors and external energon filters as well as he knows the sound of his own voice. He knows what it feels like to lie on a medical berth.

He starts to ask, "Where am I?" but thinks better of it.

Good thing, too, because Ratchet huffs and says, "Good answer." The medic straightens up so he's not looming anymore. He crosses his arms. "I suppose this is some kind of game to you?"

"No?" Sideswipe guesses.

"Because I'd really like to know the scoring system. I'd really like to know what number you assign to _breaking every major rule of engagement_."

At least the paralysis keeps Sideswipe from flinching.

"You assaulted a senior officer, stole his ship, deserted your post, went missing for an entire deca-cycle, and made contact with an alien race _specifically _against regulations. Do you know what you did? Does it even compute for you? No, don't you try to interrupt me. Do you know what the humans are calling it? Here. I noted it just for you. According to their officials you left, and I quote, 'a trail of destruction and devastation across the whole of the American Midwest.' So tell me, Sideswipe, how many points does that add up to?"

For one, suicidal nano-klik, he almost says, "forty-two." But self-preservation overrides his mouth and he stays silent.

Ratchet stands there. Sideswipe gets the distinct impression that it's all the medic can do not to haul him off and throw him into a wall.

_How did I get here?_

The last thing he remembers is pain; looking up into Scorpinok's freak face. Hot agony in his chest. Desperation clawing at him even as his limbs went numb. The fluttering presence of—

"Where's Sunny?" he says.

"Stable," Ratchet says.

Sideswipe twists his head, tries to catch a glimpse of yellow, a glimpse of his brother.

"Come on, Ratch', is he—"

And then Ratchet is right there, reaching beneath him and hoisting him up by the shoulders. Sideswipe wonders why the medic doesn't just boot him back up and let him lift himself. But that thought is shoved to the side when he spots Sunny.

Or what's left of him.

"I've been working on you both for the last two mega-cycles," Ratchet says. "There wasn't enough of Sunstreaker left to scavenge, so I have to build him back up from scratch."

His processor lies naked to the air just behind a face, this one new and shiny, not burnt, not half-slagged. A bare chest cavity and Sideswipe can see the empty spark chamber. Struts for arms and legs, the gears of his feet, bits of armor lying scattered around the berth. And the hum of a spark-well sitting on a stand to the side. Energon lines run from the top of it to a back-up tank on the floor. That little box is the only thing keeping his brother alive.

"Oh," Sideswipe says. It comes out of his mouth funny.

"You weren't much better," Ratchet says. He lays Sideswipe back down. "I had to pry your pieces out of that awful human thing, the Headmaster shell. It wasn't fun."

Headmaster shell. The tiny human.

"Hunter," Sideswipe says. "Is he okay?"

"Physically."

Ratchet fiddles with a diagnostics display. He mutters something too quiet for Sideswipe to make out, all but the, "slagging, half-bit moron" at the end of it.

He's safe. Sunny is safe. Hunter is safe.

"What happened?" Sideswipe says.

"What's the last thing you remember?"

Sideswipe winces. "Getting my aft kicked."

"Sounds about right. Hunter says this 'Scorpinok' character impaled you. From what he described, it sounds like you and Sunstreaker, that your spark chambers were breached. Your sparks made contact."

_Wait… what?_

"What?" Sideswipe says. Because he's pretty sure that can't happen. Not without explosive death.

"You're split-spark twins," Ratchet says. "Originally, you two were one being. Which, apparently, makes you two slag-heads the only ones in the known universe capable of combining sparks like that."

"Oh."

He doesn't look back over at Sunny. He can almost feel his pieces lying there.

"_Made contact?" What does that even mean?_

"So… how did I get here?"

Ratchet moves towards the foot of the berth. Sideswipe can't see his hands, not from that angle, but he can see the glow of a welder reflected off the medic's armor.

"You fused. The both of you—in your body—along with Hunter disabled Scorpinok's Headmaster. You set the engines to blow and you jumped off. Your jet-pack failed on the way down. We showed up a mega-cycle later and 'jumped your sorry carcass up to my med-bay, where I've been piecing you back together ever since."

It sounds like something he would do.

_Sunny and I fused? So that means… what, we were one mech?_

He can't quite wrap his mind around that one.

"You're different," Ratchet says.

"Huh?"

The medic looks up. The welder cuts off.

"You're you," he says. He studies Sideswipe for a moment. He doesn't say anything else.

Sideswipe feels… balanced. Better. He remembers everything, remembers Sunny being gone, remembers the cold anger. He just can't seem to recall why. It's like looking in on someone else's memories.

Ratchet makes a soft sound, hesitates, and says, "I'm glad."

It's Sideswipe's turn to stare.

"It's good to see you acting like you again," the medic says. "I just hope…"

Sideswipe waits. Ratchet doesn't trail off like that. He doesn't hesitate. He goes in and does what he needs to. He doesn't stand around and stare off into space like this.

"Uh, Ratch', you're starting to freak me out," Sideswipe says. "Sunny's okay, right? He's not going to—"

"It's not him that concerns me," Ratchet says. "Not at the moment, anyway."

His gaze meets Sideswipe's.

"Oh," Sideswipe says.

"They're not going to let you go with a slap to the wrist," Ratchet says. "They can't. Not this time."

"I know."

"This is the dumbest thing you've ever done," Ratchet says. "And considering all of the half-bit, glitched out stunts you've pulled, that says a lot."

"I know."

Ratchet looks over to where Sunny lays.

"But I'm glad you did it," he says.

There's nothing more to say. Ratchet goes back to work.

* * *

><p>They stop outside the med-bay doors. Sideswipe leans against the wall to get off his left leg. His repairs are holding together; Ratchet's work, as always, is impeccable. His leg just aches a little. He hasn't been putting much weight on it in the last couple of mega-cycles.<p>

"Are you alright?" Prowl says.

"Yeah," Sideswipe says.

New legs, new arm—or the salvaged parts Ratchet managed to patch up, anyway. The weld lines are fading. In another few mega-cycles no one will be able to tell he'd been lying in pieces in a crater.

He stands there and waits for a moment.

"Here," Prowl says. He reaches down and unlocks the energon clamps around Sideswipe's wrists.

"Thanks," Sideswipe says. He shakes his hands as feeling begins to prickle back into his fingers.

"Go. I'll wait out here."

Sideswipe nods.

They're waiting for him. He knows that. And yet, he still stands there, looking at the doors. Prowl doesn't say anything. He turns away, not-quite slouched against the wall.

_Come on, slag-head. Just go in already._

Footsteps in the hall. A familiar voice says, "Sideswipe?"

"Hunter," Sideswipe says.

Hunter comes sprinting down the hall, his eyes a little wide as he comes to a stop next to Sideswipe. "Ratchet hasn't started yet, has he?"

"No."

"Oh," Hunter says. He glances at Prowl, then looks back to Sideswipe. "I was wondering if, uh, if you would mind if I was there?"

It takes Sideswipe a moment to catch his meaning.

"I mean, I don't want to intrude. It's just—"

"Nah," Sideswipe says. "I don't mind."

He's getting better at the whole "squishy expressions" thing; he recognizes the relief on Hunter's face.

"Come on," Sideswipe says. He palms the door control.

The familiar sounds of the med-bay wash over the two of them as they step inside. The soft whir of machinery, the _pip_ of a spark monitor, the faint hum of an active medical berth, hydraulics hissing as Ratchet turns and says, "About time. I was about to comm Prowl to make sure you hadn't dropped dead. Oh. Hello, Hunter."

"Hi," Hunter says.

"Calm down, Ratch'," Sideswipe says.

"Don't tell me to calm down. You're not the one who's been in here for a deca-cycle rebuilding your brother."

"No, I wasn't," Sideswipe says.

Ratchet starts to say something and huffs. "Fine. Stay over there until I say otherwise. I want you out of sight at first. Hunter, are you staying?"

"If that's okay."

"It should be fine. Just remember what I told you. Both of you. There was extensive damage to his memory banks. I don't know what he'll remember. If I tell you to get out, then you get out, no questions, no arguments. Got it?"

"Loud and clear," Sideswipe says.

The medic stares them for a nano-klik. He nods. He reaches down and plugs into the berth.

They wait. Hunter stands quietly next to Sideswipe.

"How come the other humans aren't with you?" Sideswipe says.

Hunter shrugs. "They offered to. But… I don't know. It seems kind of personal."

A klik goes by.

"You think he's gonna be okay?" Hunter says. His voice sounds strangely small.

Sideswipe opens his mouth to respond. No sound comes out.

It used to be a running joke that the only thing that could kill Sunstreaker was Sideswipe's stupidity, since to kill Sunny, you had to be _meaner_ than Sunny. It was funny. Sideswipe used to laugh at it. Except sometimes he'd look across the room and Sunny would have this _look_ on his face. No one else seemed to notice it. Suddenly, the joke wasn't funny anymore.

"I don't know," he says.

"Here goes," Ratchet says.

Several nano-kliks of silence. Then the faint hum of a processor kicking on. Sideswipe notices movement to the side: Hunter shifts on his feet. He folds his arms over his chest, seems to think otherwise, and lets them hang at his sides.

Sideswipe watches the berth. Arms and legs carefully welded together; golden yellow armor, brand new and shining. Facial plating restored. His helm has been fitted back together. He looks like a new mech.

A faint whir—optics trying to focus.

"He's coming online," Ratchet says.

No one moves.

Optic covers flare bright blue. Sideswipe can see flickering as a diagnostic program boots up. Fingers twitch.

"Where am I?" Sunstreaker says.

"In my med-bay," Ratchet says.

The medic is plugged into the berth console, which is jacked into Sunny's processor. He's getting the same information that Sunny is. It doesn't stop him from saying, "How are you feeling? Does anything hurt?"

Sunny pauses. Then, "No."

"Good. I'm going to unplug you, now. I'd like you to sit up, _slowly_."

The berth clicks. Ratchet hovers right next to Sunny as the 'bot pushes himself up.

"How's your diagnostics scan?" Ratchet says.

"Fine."

"No balance issues?"

"No."

Ratchet nods. His optics flick to Sideswipe and he says, "Sunstreaker, do you know how you got here?"

Sunny stares at him.

"What's the last thing you remember?" Ratchet says.

Sunny frowns. He makes a noise, starts to answer, and utterly stills.

Sideswipe's mind blanks.

"I," Sunny says. He draws his legs up, shrinks down, starts to curl in on himself.

"Easy," Ratchet says. "Easy. We've got you. It's okay."

"I," Sunny says. He looks around without moving. "Where…"

Sideswipe feels it: a tug between them. That intangible line—one part to the other—calling.

_Where is Sideswipe?_ it says. Not in words. Never in words, because acknowledging a need for something is a weakness and Sunstreaker does not show weakness. But it's there. And Sideswipe can't help but step forward.

"Sunny," he says.

His twin's head whips around, gaze latches onto his. He doesn't say anything. His face says it all. Desperation and fear. Hope and joy. One flashing to the other so fast Sideswipe doubts anyone else catches them. And in a blink, they're gone, tucked back under a mask where no one will see.

"Oh," Sunny says.

The mask isn't perfect, though. Sunny's optics are a little too wide for that.

"What do you mean, 'oh'?" Sideswipe says. "That's all I get? It's not even a word."

His twin sits there, curled up, staring. Sideswipe's grin falters.

Ratchet takes one look at him and says, "Alright. I've got other projects I've been neglecting. I trust one of you will comm me if the other drops?"

"Yeah," Sideswipe says. "Sure thing."

The medic nods. He looks down at Hunter and jerks his head towards the doors. The human casts one last look at Sunstreaker and then follows after him. The doors hiss shut behind them.

Silence.

Machinery whirs, the engines thrum, Sunny sits there. Not a head, not twisted wreckage cradled in his arm. He looks fine. He looks whole. He _looks_…

And Sideswipe doesn't know what to say, where to start. Not just about the last mega-cycles. This is longer. Meta-cycles. _Mega_-cycles.

Sunny's not looking at him anymore. His gaze darts around the room, the various equipment, the ceiling, the floor, everywhere but Sideswipe.

He needs to say something. The bond is there, shining, almost new, but trembling, uncertain. Sunny's hesitation and his own, old anger, old guilt—so much guilt—old hurts.

_It's my job_, he thinks. _I can't let you leave, not again._

He needs to say something before Sunny can pull away again and Sideswipe can shut him out. Something. Anything. A word.

"Shit," Sideswipe says. He's not even sure where that comes from—one of the humans, likely. It works, though. Sunny is wrenched from whatever limbo he buried himself in. He finally looks at Sideswipe.

For a nano-klik, Sideswipe freezes. Then, before he can lose his nerve, he blunders forward.

"I'm sorry," he says. "About everything. I—"

"It's okay."

"No, it's—"

"Sideswipe."

Sideswipe shuts up.

Sunny looks around again. Slowly this time, not like he expects a Decepticon to leap out of the shadows at him.

"How'd I get here?" he says.

"Long version or short one?" Sideswipe says.

Sunny gives him a look.

"_Fine_. Do you… do you remember any of it?"

Sunny doesn't answer. He doesn't move. Somehow, to Sideswipe, he seems smaller. Sideswipe tries not to hobble as he makes his way to the berth. He hops up. He slides over until he's not-quite touching Sunny.

"What happened to you?" Sunny says, after a moment.

"_Apparently_, I took a nose dive out of a ship right before it blew up."

The expression on Sunny's face is a priceless mixture of incredulity and scowl.

"Oh, don't worry," Sideswipe says. "You were there, too."

Incredulity, scowl, and _suspicion_. Sideswipe doesn't even know how his brother can fit all of those onto his face at the same time. He laughs. He looks down at his knees.

"It," he says. He stops. "It sucked not having you around."

Sideswipe's fingers still tingle. He realizes he's been staring at his wrists. He wiggles his fingers. He'll have to go back to his cell soon.

A scrape as Sunny scoots across that last, tiny gap of space between them to lean against Sideswipe.

But not yet. He can stay here a little while longer. He wraps one arm around Sunny.

"You put one scratch in my armor and I'll tear your head off," Sunstreaker says.

Sideswipe grins.

* * *

><p>Forty miles into the New Mexican desert, five miles from the nearest conceivable stretch of road, is an underground bunker. The walls are four feet of solid steel surrounded by another five feet of reinforced concrete. The only way in is hidden under a piece of desert. It slides back to reveal a narrow ramp. Dust drifts down. The room is a tomb. And it has a visitor.<p>

The door is forced open; it squeals along its tracks in protest. Sunlight pours through, into the bunker, for the first time in two weeks. The floor is bare, the walls are bare. Nothing stirs within.

The visitor sneers.

Against the far wall sits a pedestal holding a mangled, robotic head. Half its face has been torn off. The helm is cracked. The orange optic band is shattered. Wiring connects it to the pedestal but, like everything else in the room, it's dark.

"Scorpinok," the visitor says.

The band remains dark; there's not enough power left in the head to turn it on. But optics whir and adjust their focus.

"Ssss," the head says. "Ssst-ar-ssscreamm. Wh-aat?"

"Oh good," Starscream says. "You're still functioning."

Scorpinok's head makes an inarticulate noise. Starscream clasps his hands behind his back and takes a few steps in. He makes a show of inspecting the walls.

"You know," he says, "it's not as bad in here as I feared it would be. I find it a bit cramped, personally, but I can see you don't share that problem."

"I c-nn excss-pl-nn."

"Explain? Explain what?"

"Tes-t ssub-jec-t—"

"You mean Sunstreaker?" Starscream says. He circles the pedestal, watching Scorpinok's optics swivel to track him. "What about him?"

"Unn-forss-nn—"

Starscream grabs the head between his claws.

"_Really_?" he says. "'Unforeseen?' You took the _only_ Autobot in existence with a _psychotic twin_ as your proto-type! What did you expect to happen?"

"Nex-t ti-mme."

"No. There's not going to be a next time. I can't _afford_ a next time. I can't afford to deal with incompetent fools. If Megatron finds out—"

The head creaks. The jaw cracks. Starscream forces his fingers to loosen, forces his hand to pull away.

"No," he says. "Your facilities have been raided, your property seized. The humans are looking for you, Scorpinok. And it's not just the flesh-bags. The Autobots have taken a keen interest in your activities as well."

"Wh-aat?"

"Oh, don't worry. I'm sure they'll never find you here. That was the point, wasn't it? That's why you had your Headmaster hide you here? To make sure _no one_ could find you? It's a pity it died before it could retrieve you."

"No—"

"Please, don't even bother denying it. Who do you think you're speaking to? I knew all about your little hidey-hole. You didn't think I would have had you monitored?"

"Pl-zz."

"But that doesn't matter. I don't care that you tried to run. I expected no less. And really, you've done me a favor."

Starscream smiles.

"Www-ai-t!"

His claws ram into the head's mouth and drive up. Scorpinok lets out a garbled wail. The sound chokes, sputters, and dies. Starscream rips his hand free. Pieces of processor clatter to the ground in a spatter of energon.

He flicks the excess off his fingers.

Once the ramp cover slides back into place, the bunker fades into the desert. Starscream surveys it for a moment and then leaps up and blasts into the sky.

END

* * *

><p>There it is, all done, just like I promised only three years ago. This story might never have seen the light of day had not my fantastic beta, KayDeeBlu, kept encouraging me to go through and make it work. Your advice was wonderful and your enthusiasm for this project kept me from taking it outside and lighting it on fire.<p>

Starfire201 was my first reviewer with lildevchick falling in a close second. You guys were the ones who kept me posting even though I'm pretty sure you and only a very, very small handful of people read it. But you did, and you let me know what you thought with every chapter. Words can't express how grateful I am you guys took the time out of your day to do that. You made this whole thing worth it. Thank you.

Thank you tsukyasha, Jessica Wolfe, Paleodex, and HistorySavvyRobots for your wonderful reviews, too. I'm really glad you found this story and I'm really glad you liked it enough to review.

And that concludes it. I'm not gonna say that I'm leaving fandom for good, (mostly because I've said that before and look where that got me), but I am taking a hiatus from it to focus on original work. Thank you everyone, it's been great, peace out.

~The Toe of Sauron


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